MPs and activists should be asking themselves a big question: what is it that made him popular in the first place?
Each week, our panel of John O’Sullivan, Rachel Wolf, Trevor Phillips, Tim Montgomerie and Marcus Roberts will analyse and assess what’s happening.
The vocation of the front-runner is not to mess up. And he hasn’t. Indeed, he has picked up support – and upped the pace.
Amongst the hopefuls, he fares best on account of his competence, his ability to handle Brexit, manage the economy and unite the country.
The match-up between the two sets of numbers is extremely close.
In a field this crowded and with an electorate so, er, sophisticated, make no assumptions about which names will be forwarded to Party members.
The unrebuttable fact is that the Prime Minister is in breach of her word, and that the collapse of trust in the Party threatens to be terminal.
There are clearly dangers in accepting the terms set out by green activists – who essentially argue that we can only protect the environment by slowing growth.
Conservative MPs should not sit idly by as their party’s ratings sink to the mid-30s and below. There’s reason to think the change isn’t temporary.
It’s hard to see how the Conservatives can sustain their electoral position by U-turning on Brexit. Its core vote will surely completely collapse.
If it is framed through the prism of tolerance and anti-bullying, most people support it. But there are still political pitfalls.
There is a now a window of opportunity for a better, more sensible and cross-party debate than the one we had in the referendum campaign.
Each week, our panel of John O’Sullivan, Rachel Wolf, Trevor Phillips, Tim Montgomerie and Marcus Roberts will analyse and assess what’s happening.