Liz Truss’s latest big idea? Convincing us she never existed

If the former PM’s bizarre – and surprisingly well-attended – conference sideshow had a purpose, it was as a mind trick to wipe her catastrophic 49-day premiership from the electorate’s memory, writes Tom Peck

The tagline for Liz Truss’s conference rally was ‘Make Britain Grow Again’ (Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire)

Sketchwriters were initially banned from the Liz Truss rally. Only news reporters were permitted to add their names to the list. But at some point, someone must have worked out that a Liz Truss rally will, by definition, reduce a news reporter to a satirist, and so they relented.

You can only imagine the crisis meeting. Many years ago, still in the afterglow of her “that is a disgrace” speech on the subject of imported cheese, Truss – then environment secretary – told me personally that she had deliberately staged a photo opportunity and speech at the premises of a cheese manufacturer. She hoped that journalists would not be able to turn down the opportunity to go and laugh at her, and was disappointed that the temptation had somehow been widely resisted.

So it is possible – likely, even – that the last-minute volte face came at her own instigation. That she’d had to have a quiet word with her advisers, to let them know that if you try to keep out the people who are only there to laugh, then no one is going to turn up.