SO who would you like to be your next Prime Minister?

It doesn’t really matter because you are not going to get a vote. Only the 160,000 or so members of the Conservative Party – that’s 0.3 per cent of the adult British population – are going to get a say in choosing our next head of state.

And they are not typical of the British population, either in make-up or in their views. They are most likely to be older (median age 57 as opposed to the national average of 40), well off (80 per cent ABC1s) white (95 per cent are white British) males (63pc are men) who live in the south (42 per cent of members live in the south outside London).

According to an Opinium poll, 37 per cent of Tory members believe Boris Johnson’s government has over-reacted to climate change, and 31 per cent do not like the levelling up investment going to the north and the Midlands. However, 42 per cent do agree that the cost-of-living is the biggest issue facing the new Prime Minister.

The position of the Tees Valley and County Durham is all the more interesting in this because at the last election, it, perhaps more than other regions, voted personally for Boris Johnson, “loaning” the Conservative Party its vote to get Mr Johnson into office.

So shouldn’t those voters have a role in choosing his replacement?

The funny old British constitution precludes that, but you have a vote on a poll running on The Northern Echo’s website over the weekend. Knowing who local people like most may help our local Tory members when they come to cast their votes.

SUNAK OR TRUSS: VOTE HERE