THE TORY PARTY was plunged into fresh turmoil last night with the announcement that it is to have a recall election, after the dismal performance of Iain “Gray” Duncan Smith. And rumours are already circulating that the party has decided to go outside the political mainstream in search of the person who can resurrect its failing public image.

Front-runners for the post include Kennie Clarkennegger, the ruthless, monosyllabic popular hero. He has already done two career-Terminator movies, and, despite saying he’d never make a third, is the people’s choice.

Clarke, a former body builder who has served in Vietnam (as a tobacco salesman), came to prominence during the Eighties as the eponymous star “The Pudgy Puffball”. His campaign has been dogged by his controversial relationships with women (note his role in End of the Iron Lady). He has also been tarred by association with far-Right politics, and in his youth once expressed admiration for Margaret Thatcher. The fact that he never even read the script of the controversial John Major classic Treaty of Maastricht didn’t seem to do him any lasting damage.

There are other candidates: Michael Howard, star of the women-in-prison movie Something of the Night, in which he came to blows with the gorgeous blonde Ann Widdecombe.

Oliver “Dolph” Letwin, who recently announced plans to make Meet the Sheriff, and is about to star in an unnamed sci-fi thriller about an innocent man stuck on an unknown island full of asylum-seekers. Beneath his diffident manner and hard-nosed policies lies a sensitive man. He recently fought off an intruder, and is even believed to read books.

Theresa May, the publicity-hungry actress who last year wore leopard-skin high heels in the controversial but ill-fated flop The Nasty Party, and who is this year appearing in the violent blockbuster Kill Iain: Vol 1, as a cat-suited kung fu expert.

Former child star William Hague, best known perhaps for Keep the Pound and the straight-to-video flop A Foreign Land, has already said: “I won’t be back.”

John Redwood, who played the Vulcan in Star Trek 26: No Change, No Chance.

Former matinée idol and Ribena-advert actor Michael Portillo, famous for his demotic speaking style, showcased in Darling of the Right and Who Dares Wins. His early image as a dyed-in-the wool Thatcherite has been curbed in recent years by a series of sensitive roles, particularly in the Ken Loach-directed It Must Be Awful Being Poor, and I was a Hospital Porter for An Entire Week (except on Friday, Obviously, When I Had to Go Out to the Country). These days he prefers to work in television.

In contrast to Portillo, there is David Davis, who as well as actually being a member of the SAS has also put in a particularly telling performance in The Shadow Cabinet, a film noir about a bunch of complete nonentities who plot to overthrow the Government, with hilarious consequences.

Under the extremely complicated voting system, a candidate does not actually also have to be a Member of Parliament, which is just as well as there are hardly any of them. And this also leaves the door wide open for a number of others: Chris Patten, the so-called Muscles from Brussels whose last hit was Escape from Hong Kong.

Steve “Shagger” Norris, who starred in Dick Whittington, a romantic comedy about a philanderer who went to London to try to become mayor. It flopped, after its unexpectedly downbeat ending in which he lost out to his love rival Red Ken.

Alternatively, they could always go for Hugh Grant, who plays the Prime Minister in the new film Love, Actually and, according to the latest polls, is the most popular choice.