Leader of the Scottish Tories Douglas Ross said he believes Liz Truss can win the next general election on BBC Question Time drawing howls of laughter from the audience.
Ms Truss has been at the helm for little over a month following the resignation of Boris Johnson and is already under considerable pressure with talks now of Conservative plots to replace her.
Chaos was caused by a mini-budget from Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng that saw the pound sink to record lows against the dollar and following a U-turn there is now talk of the Government planning further fiscal changes.
On Question Time, senior Conservative MP Mr Ross said he was sticking by the Prime Minister but there was laughter when he said he believed she would win the next election.
In response to a woman in the audience asking him if he thought she would win he replied: “Yes, look.”
But before he could get much further there were chuckles in the studio, and he eventually continued: “I want the Conservatives to win every election.”
Presenter Fiona Bruce jumped in: “You’re saying that with quite a smile on your face, I can’t read it.”
Mr Ross said: “I can just imagine what you’d say if I said no there. I want the Conservatives to win every election."
It was then pointed out that the question had been if he thought Ms Truss would win the election.
And the leader of the Scottish Tories replied: “It was if I want Liz Truss to win the next election and I do, I want the leader of the Conservative Party to win.
But the woman in the audience persisted: “I said do you think she’ll win?”
Mr Ross said: “Look, we are a long way off from the next election, the polls right now are very difficult for the party.”
The woman asked: “Yes or no?” and Mr Ross said: “I said yes, I said right at the top, yes I do.”
There was then some surprised murmuring in the studio and he continued: “Because I think we can get the economy back up and running again, I think we can help people.”
Referring to the other panellists he said: “Clearly Anas (Sarwar) thinks Keir Starmer can win the next election, clearly John Swinney thinks (....) the SNP can win a de facto referendum.
“Every party wants their party to win but at the moment to me that is a secondary issue. The big issue right now is helping people. People in this room, people across the country, businesses and communities that are struggling.”
The woman in the audience concluded: “You’ve got wonderful optimism.”
And Mr Sarwar quipped: “We should VAR that decision,” in reference to Mr Ross’ other career as a football referee.”
Also on the programme Mr Ross said that the Government needs to get a “grip” on the economy.
He said: “I just want to address the point because people are struggling….that’s why I’ve said the Prime Minister and the Chancellor have to get a grip on this.
"There have been mistakes, they’ve got to work this out to settle the markets, to settle the economy and to get things back up and running again.
"But no one is treating this trivially, this is the most serious thing facing our country right now and we’ve got to respond and deal with it right now.”
