Eight make ballot to succeed Johnson as UK Tory leader and PM

The field to replace Boris Johnson as the next Conservative party leader and prime minister narrowed on Tuesday evening as eight candidates qualified for the ballot ahead of the first round of voting on Wednesday.

Sajid Javid, the former health secretary, dropped out of a race characterised by anonymous briefings between rival camps, while home secretary Priti Patel decided not to run, avoiding further splits in the large field of rightwing candidates.

Rishi Sunak, the former chancellor, is the bookmakers’ favourite to win, with William Hill giving him odds of 13/8, followed by Penny Mordaunt, junior trade minister, on 2/1 and foreign secretary Liz Truss on 7/2. A new poll by Opinium said Sunak was the preferred candidate for 28 per cent of Tory party members, followed by Truss on 20 per cent.

Sunak launched his campaign with a promise to fight a clean contest, vowing not to “demonise” Johnson and saying the prime minister had “a good heart”. Despite his emollient language, allies of the outgoing prime minister, who have accused Sunak of treachery, mobilised to try to “stop Rishi”.

Other candidates who succeeded in staying in the race on Tuesday include former equalities minister Kemi Badenoch, attorney-general Suella Braverman, ex-health secretary Jeremy Hunt, foreign affairs select committee chair Tom Tugendhat and new chancellor Nadhim Zahawi.

Amid growing bitterness, culture secretary Nadine Dorries, who endorsed Truss’s bid for the leadership, claimed that “dirty tricks” and “a stitch-up” was taking place, with votes being loaned to Jeremy Hunt’s campaign to put him up against Sunak.

“Team Rishi want the candidate they know they can definitely beat in the final two and that is Jeremy Hunt,” she said. An official on Hunt’s campaign described the claim as a “smear” that was “categorically untrue”.

Candidates were required to win the backing of 20 other MPs to get on the ballot. In the first round of voting on Wednesday, they will need the support of at least 30 to proceed into the second round on Thursday. The field will be cut to two candidates by July 21 with the next leader chosen by Tory party members by September 5.

With Sunak the hot favourite to make it to the shortlist of two, the other contenders are battling for the second spot.

Senior figures within the party began to show their hand on Tuesday, with Truss also endorsed by Brexit opportunities minister and Johnson ally Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Mordaunt, whose number of publicly declared backers is second only to the ex-chancellor, won the support of former Brexit secretary David Davis who stated she was the “most likely to beat Rishi Sunak”.

Badenoch, who launched her campaign on Tuesday, pledged to scrap the government’s net zero climate targets with a pitch she described as focused on “free markets, limited government and a strong nation state”.

Tugendhat, who has won support from the left of the party and northern MPs, set out a policy-heavy agenda and argued that the UK “desperately needs unity not faction” and a “clean break” from the Johnson era.

Zahawi, who has yet to hold a formal campaign launch, will speak at two hustings events in parliament on Thursday.

Meanwhile Johnson refused to allow time for a Labour no-confidence vote, stating that the opposition party was trying to “play politics”. Labour in turn accused the Tories of “running scared”.

Tony Danker, director-general of the CBI employers’ group, has written to the Tory leadership candidates urging them to develop “serious, credible and bold plans for growth”. 

Danker suggested that companies would prefer “investment-targeted business tax measures” — such as extending the current investment super-deduction — to a reversal in the planned rise in corporation tax.