Typically for Liz Truss, even her choice of Tory party conference walk-on music caused a row.
The prime minister strode onstage to deliver her keynote speech at Birmingham’s International Convention Centre to the strains of M People’s 1993 hit, Movin’ On Up.
Except no one had apparently bothered to check the anti-Tory views of the band’s co-founder, Mike Pickering, or the fact that lead singer Heather’s Small’s son is a Labour councillor.
Both were quick to make their feelings known, with James Small-Edwards linking the the song’s lyrics about “moving on out” to the Tories’ dire poll ratings.
Compared to the chaotic 48 hours that preceded Truss’s speech, however, it was a relatively minor controversy.
The Conservative MPs who had actually bothered to make the trip to the West Midlands could only look on in horror as chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng was forced into a humiliating U-turn on his plan to abolish the 45p rate of tax paid by the UK’s highest earners.
There was then the astonishing spectacle of collective cabinet responsibility completely breaking down over Truss’s plans to cut benefits in real terms.
That led to former transport secretary Grant Shapps - who was sacked by the PM - effectively giving her 10 days to save her job, barely a month after she took over from Boris Johnson.
All of that came in the wake of Kwarteng’s disastrous mini-budget, which led to a collapse in the value of the pound and a hike in interest rates as the money markets reacted to his plans for £45 billion of unfunded tax cuts.
Even more alarming for MPs anxiously eyeing the size of their majorities, the last 10 days have seen Labour establish a huge lead in the opinion polls.
As MPs prepare to return to parliament on Tuesday, HuffPost UK has spoken to a wide selection of Tories to assess the prime minister’s chances of survival.
“Let’s see where we are next weekend but I can’t see her making it to Christmas,” one former cabinet minister who backed Truss in the Tory leadership contest said. “We can’t go on like this for two years.”
Another ex-minister said: “She’s in real trouble. Her first few weeks have been awful. We had the very divisive reshuffle, where anyone who didn’t support her was sacked, and now she’s acting like she’s won an election and has a mandate to pursue a completely new economic strategy.
“Liz presented herself as the continuity Johnson candidate, which won her the support of his allies, but she’s now ripping up all of his policies.
“She has made a rod for her own back and I think she now realises that she needs to reach out and bring more people onboard.”
One MP said they had been approached by colleagues predicting a “backlash” against Truss, amid talk of more than 20 letters of no confidence in her leadership already having been submitted to Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tories.
“Only about a third of Conservative MPs support her, so she effectively doesn’t have a Commons majority,” the backbencher said. “She needs to reach out and broaden her appeal within the parliamentary party or she is finished.”
The 45p and benefits rebellions led to briefings from Number 10 that MPs who fail to toe the line could have the Tory whip withdrawn.
But one MP said: “Every time that that’s been threatened in the past it’s had the opposite effect and just made people rebel more. It doesn’t work these days.
“The fact is that most of the parliamentary party didn’t support her, so she needs to take people with her from now on or she’ll be in a lot of trouble.”
A Red Wall MP also pointed to the need for Truss to take a more conciliatory approach if she wants to get the policies she wants through the Commons.
“I think the 45p U-turn and her conference speech have greatly improved matters,” he said. “Obviously some MPs are still unhappy and she and her team need to manage the parliamentary party with care.”
One senior Tory adviser said “Christmas seems to be the longest she has”, but warned that yet another change of PM would make demands for a general election difficult to ignore.
“If they do boot her out her then a general election will have to happen, which is bonkers as we will probably lose,” they said.
“We can’t have a coronation but equally the country wouldn’t stand for another vanity contest. Either option leads to an early election. And who would they choose to coronate? I doubt Rishi Sunak would be interested so it leaves very little choice.”
Andrew Bridgen, who supported Sunak, agreed that another change in leader would lead to a general election.
He said: “With the political situation as it is at the moment, both internationally and domestically, a period of six to eight weeks of stasis for a leadership election or a general election would be a dereliction of duty.”
A Tory insider said: “Next week is crucial. I think we need to see how parliament is and the mood of MPs.
“I don’t believe they’ll take the whip off people yet, but they need to set the course for discipline next week. That will affect her survival.”
Another added: “Short-term I think, yes, she can survive. MPs mostly feel that it would be absurd to get rid of her now before she’s even had a chance to settle into the role and begin to get on with her agenda.
“Longer-term, however, if the polls are as dire as they are now as we get closer to an election, then nothing will be off the table.”
A senior backbencher described Truss’s conference speech - in which she described her opponents as an “anti-growth coalition” - as “the first brick in the wall” in the PM’s attempts to rebuild her reputation.
The MP said talk of replacing Truss with a new leader was a “fantasy”.
“We can’t afford another fractious six months like the last six months,” they said. “She now needs discipline with the cabinet and diplomacy with the backbenches.”
The consensus seems to be that Truss remains safe for now. But without a dramatic change in the way she leads, her long-term future remains far from certain.