Conservative, having been found out, fell to pieces (8)
I believe the answer is:
crumbled
'out fell to pieces' is the definition.
I can't judge whether this defines the answer.
'conservative having been' is the wordplay.
'conservative' becomes 'crumb' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'having' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'been' becomes 'led' (leading is a kind of being).
'crumb'+'led'='CRUMBLED'
'found' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for crumbled that I've seen before include "fell apart" , "fragmented" , "went to pieces" .)