A live tv debate between the contenders for the Tory leadership was pulled off air after presenter Kate McCann fainted.
Liz Truss was left looking shocked and alarmed as a crashing sound was heard off camera midway through the hour-long debate.
Truss appeared to move from her podium to go and assist in the off-screen incident.
She and rival Rishi Sunak had been answering question from McCann, Talk TV presenter and debate moderator, when the incident happened.
The programme cut away to a test card apologising for the disruption.
Talk TV tweeted: "Kate McCann fainted on air tonight and although she is fine, the medical advice was that we shouldn't continue with the debate. We apologise to our viewers and listeners."
Senior Tories sent their best wishes to McCann, with Welsh Secretary Sir Robert Buckland tweeting that he hoped she was OK.
Foreign Office minister Amanda Milling said: “She was doing a brilliant job. Get well soon!”
Sunak also tweeted: “Good news that you’re already recovering @KateEMcCann.
“It was a great debate and I look forward to getting grilled by you again shortly.”
Before the debate was halted, Sunak said it was “entirely reasonable” to ask the largest companies to pay “a bit more” tax because they received taxpayer-funded support during the pandemic.
The former chancellor told The Sun/TalkTV debate: “As we think about ‘well, how do we fix this problem, how do we fund the things, the public services that we rely on’, is it reasonable to ask the biggest companies in the country to pay a bit more tax?
“They still will pay a very generous rate of tax compared to most other countries.”
But Truss, who would scrap the scheduled 19p to 25p increase in corporation tax, said: “I am not talking about cutting corporation tax, I’m talking about not raising corporation tax.
“Under Rishi’s plan we will end up raising corporation tax to the same level it is in France, more than 10 percentage points higher than it is in Ireland.”
Sunak’s policies would make the UK less competitive and push the country into recession, she warned.
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