The Conservative leadership showed a firm hand yesterday and withdrew the party whip in the House of Lords from Lord Archer, its disgraced former candidate for mayor of London, following his confession that he fabricated an alibi before a libel case in 1987.
With the Tory peer's personal and political reputation in tatters, he now faces the prospect of being thrown out of the party when he is hauled before the party's ethics and integrity committee to account for the "false assurances" he gave.
He will be asked specifically to explain his admission that he asked a friend to lie for him in connection with his libel case against Express Newspapers, for the Daily Star, in which he was awarded £500,000.
Lord Archer's spectacular fall from favour was confirmed by the Conservative leader, Mr William Hague, who said his behaviour was deeply regrettable. "This is the end of politics for Jeffrey Archer. I will not tolerate behaviour like this in my party," he said. "In the past, such matters have dragged on for weeks, but this has been dealt with within a matter of days."
The party chairman, Mr Michael Ancram, also said there would be no further public position in the party for the millionaire novelist.
"I think that is a realistic assessment, given what has happened," said Mr Ancram, who denied suggestions that the party could have referred Lord Archer to its ethics and integrity committee when he stood in the selection process earlier this year.
After a disastrous 48 hours for the party, Mr Ancram insisted the News of the World story and Lord Archer's subsequent confession was the first time that an allegation against him had not previously been dealt with in a court or by the party.
Earlier, signalling his intention to rebuild the party's damaged image and restore credibility to its mayoral election campaign, Mr Hague declared the party was not to blame for the turn of events. Rather it was Lord Archer who had given "false assurances" about his past, he said.
With Lord Archer's confession already in the public domain, Scotland Yard moved swiftly to confirm that senior detectives were in the early stages of investigating a complaint from the Daily Star.
The paper's editor, Mr Peter Hill, said the original jury in the case might not have believed any of Lord Archer's evidence if it had known he had persuaded a friend to lie for him.
The paper is to appeal the verdict in the libel trial brought by Lord Archer and wants the money it paid to him returned, while he faces the prospect of a prison sentence for conspiring to pervert the course of justice.
The decision by the Conservatives' London executive to rerun the selection process is a disappointment for the former Tory MP, Mr Steven Norris, who was runner-up to Lord Archer and hoped to take his place as party candidate.
Insisting the party must get it right this time, Mr Norris said he would be prepared to face the ethics committee but would wait and see who else stood as a candidate before committing himself to another campaign.
The Tory candidate should be in place in January, a month before Labour names its candidate, and several familiar names were being mooted at Westminster yesterday.
However, the prospective Tory MP, Mr Michael Portillo, rejected the candidacy, saying he wanted to stand in parliament and firmly ruling himself out of the race.
A spokesman for the former Tory prime minister, Mr John Major, said: "He cannot be persuaded to be a candidate for mayor."
The Scotland Yard detective who helped jail Jonathan Aitkin for perjury has been called in to investigate Lord Archer, police said tonight. Det Supt Geoff Hunt was today assigned to examine the allegations of conspiracy to perjure.