A simple question: how long can Liz Truss last as Prime Minister?

Barely a month into her premiership the talk in a sizeable section of the Conservative party is of removing her.

That is why four cabinet ministers — home secretary Suella Braverman, Commons leader Penny Mordaunt, chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Nadhim Zahawi, and environment secretary Ranil Jayawardena — have all written pleading articles in the Sunday newspapers urging warring factions in the party to unite behind its new leader or risk extinction in the general election.

This makes absolute sense except the fear is that with Truss as leader, the Tories face an even greater disaster.

Under Tory party rules, she is safe for a year but ministers admit these can be changed to allow for a no-confidence motion.

One problem for the Prime minister is that she is not the choice of Tory MPs but was imposed on them by the Conservative party membership, which preferred her to Rishi Sunak.

As Tory MPs get back to Westminster on Monday after a summer break and the passing of the Queen, a source at 10, Downing Street said the “cold hard reality” is the party must “get behind Liz” or wind up with a “monstrous coalition of Labour and the SNP (Scottish National Party)”.

Perhaps worst of all for Truss, she has become a figure of fun. She is being derided for her speech at the recent Tory party conference in Birmingham when she attacked the “anti-growth coalition”.

The Financial Times did a dispassionate analysis of her month in office and concluded: “Liz Truss has had a terrible start as Prime Minister, to judge from opinion polls that have recorded huge leads for Labour over the Conservatives since she entered Downing Street.

“Labour has secured leads of 30 percentage points or more in four polls since chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s ‘mini’-Budget” involving £45bn of unfunded tax cuts.

“But Truss’s position is worse than the headline voting intention data suggest: there appears to be little public appetite for the policies she is pursuing to achieve higher economic growth, as well as a lack of trust in her delivering the agenda, according to a Financial Times analysis.”

On Sunday, Andrew Rawnsley, chief political commentator of the Observer, put

the plotting into simple language: “One month into this PM’s reign and already the chatter is about how to remove her. On paper, Liz Truss commands a hefty Commons majority of 71. In practice, she is a Prime Minister with a majority of less than zero. We have what is effectively a hung parliament in which the Truss faction is not even the largest party.”

An article in the Right-wing Spectator by Katy Ball, the magazine’s deputy political editor, did not offer Truss much comfort either.

Could it be Rishi by Christmas? was the headline over the article.