Conservatives have been told to stop toppling their leaders in the search of a Messiah. The party of Thatcher has been reminded the Iron Lady herself was once seen as “hopeless” and “shrill”.

Sir Iain Duncan Smith – who succeeded William Hague as party leader in the wake of Labour’s 2001 landslide and helmed the Tories from September 2001 to November 2003 – warns the search for a political Messiah has been a “disaster” for the Conservatives.

He said: “The public think that we are panickers because in the space of less than 10 years we have seen the back of five prime ministers and the public I think is sick of that.”

The Tories have been led by David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak over the last decade – and Sir Iain is clear that switching leaders again is not the answer to the party’s present polling difficulties.

Techne’s latest poll puts Nigel Farage’s Reform UK on 30%, followed by Labour (22%), the Conservatives (17%) and the Liberal Democrats (16%).

Sir Iain argues the public want to see a party that no longer ousts the people entrusted with the top job

He said: “They want to know that we are a stable party that does what we say and not a party that every five seconds decides it’s got to decapitate the next person in charge and call for a Messiah. There is no Messiah out there.

“This Messiah complex that we seem to have is a disaster for us and the search for this Messiah hasn’t worked so far and it’s not going to work.”

Many Tories talk about Margaret Thatcher in near-mythical terms, but Sir Iain argues she did not arrive with this reputation as a “colossus”.

He said: “I remember when Mrs Thatcher came to [the leadership]. Lots of people very quickly claimed she was hopeless, shrill, difficult, not the person who would lead us to glory...

“Luckily the Conservative party wasn’t quite so fixated on getting rid of their leaders as they have been. She got time to develop and, wow, did she develop.

“The woman who we remember now who bestrode the world like a colossus was not the woman who got elected in 1975 in the eyes of the public.”

Sir Iain believes the party must develop credible solutions to the issues of top concerns to voters – and prove it can be trusted with government.

“We need to show we are not just a political party that spends its time up in Westminster assassinating one another,” he said.