THERESA May’s intervention in the House of Commons drew coos from the commentariat on Monday, crediting the former PM with hammering yet another nail into the coffin of the incumbent.

Admittedly, it was a devastating assessment of de Pfeffel’s excuses: either he and his team hadn’t read the rules they made, they didn’t understand them or they didn’t think they were subject to them.

ITV’s political editor Robert Peston described it as “the moment of the day”. It may well prove the moment of her career if it provides a cornerstone her new of Elder Stateswoman May. Maybot no more. 

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This is the same May who appointed Johnson as her Foreign Secretary – a post he held for two years. This was, if anyone’s keeping score, after he’d been sacked for lying at The Times, the racist columns, the affairs and money spaffing run as Mayor of London.

Baroness Ruth Davidson of Lundin Links came close to shedding real-life human tears on Channel 4 news while she recounted the times she had spoken to commoners about the toll Covid restrictions had taken on their lives.

Aaron Bell, the Tory MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme, revealed he travelled three hours to attend his grandmother’s funeral, didn’t stop to hug his grieving parents and siblings because he was following the Covid rules. He asked: “Does the Prime Minister think I’m a fool?”

Arresting stuff – unless you’re Johnson, in both senses – but to put it bluntly, yes Bell. He does.

But Bell’s powerful question revealed also that he doesn’t have to be a fool forever. He can use his undoubtedly genuine but until this point, conveniently suppressed outrage, and make political hay.

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A 2019er, his fate until this point has been tied up with the Prime Minister’s fortunes. Until this point. Now Johnson’s star is waning, it is no longer expedient to support him. Indeed, if he’s after new schools, hospitals and the likes for his constituents, it may prove more important to be seen as anti- not pro-BoJo.

So too for Christian Wakefield, the MP between the Tories and Labour really is only as big as the distance between the front benches.

Politics, especially of the Westminster stripe, is more about who’s up and who’s down than your values.

Observe the sordid spectacle of the crocodiles, crawling through the mire, minds fixed firmly on re-election, ministerial positions and making friends with people on the up, rounding on their weakened, limping prey. But not yet striking.

Because of course, this is all theatre. Johnson faced his MPs at a meeting of the 1922 Committee, where for all their handwringing in public, he came out still the Prime Minister you love to hate and not facing a no-confidence vote.

The Jouker wasn’t there but we can imagine deals, pleading and bargaining, of the debasing sort rarely seen outside of a Saw film. Desperate people begging, rapidly flailing around to stay politically alive. Sounds lovely.

Don’t be fooled by their crocodile tears. This isn’t a Prime Minister that will survive the next year. The Tories know that. This scandal isn’t going away. It’s only a matter of time and some are setting out their stalls sooner than others.