It tells you all you need to know about what an utter shambles the UK Conservative Party had become that when, as polls closed last Thursday night and the exit survey predicted it would win 131 seats, there was palpable relief among many Tories. They had feared the result would be worse – at one stage, opinion polls had put them in a close race for second place with the Liberal Democrats.

To many minds, 100 seats became the psychological threshold between annihilation, and merely a terrible result. When the seats were declared, the actual number – 121 – was a bit worse than the exit poll, but even that was towards the upper end of expectations. As former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng told journalists, this was not an “extinction event”.

Former UK prime minister Boris Johnson announces his resignation........

© The Sydney Morning Herald