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LAST UPDATE | 18 Jul 2022
RISHI SUNAK REMAINS the frontrunner after the third round of the Tory leadership contest, with Penny Mordaunt still in second place amid an increasingly bitter contest.
In the third ballot of the Tory leadership contest this evening, Sunak got 115 votes, Mordaunt 82, Liz Truss 71, Kemi Badenoch 58 and Tom Tugendhat 31.
Attorney General and right-winger Suella Braverman, who was knocked out of the contest last week, had thrown her weight behind Truss.
That endorsement, however, appears to have not been enough to push the Foreign Secretary into second place.
The ballot came after another fraught day of campaigning in the Tory Party leadership contest, despite concerns being expressed publicly about the growing divisions within the party over the contest.
Most notable on Monday was the accusation that Mordaunt missed ministerial meetings because she was plotting her Tory leadership bid.
The trade minister’s absence from meetings forced colleagues to pick up the pieces, International Trade Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan earlier alleged.
In a sign of the concern about the way the leadership race is being conducted, Sunak and Truss confirmed they did not want to take part in a Sky News debate planned for Tuesday – prompting the broadcaster to cancel the show.
“Conservative MPs are said to be concerned about the damage the debates are doing to the image of the Conservative Party, exposing disagreements and splits within the party,” a Sky statement said.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he is “astonished” by candidates withdrawing from the debate, arguing that it demonstrates a lack of “confidence”.
He told reporters at a central London bank: “I can see, based on what I’ve seen in the debates so far, why they want to do so because this is a party that is out of ideas, out of purpose, they’re tearing each other apart.”
The leadership contenders – Sunak, Truss, Mordaunt and Badenoch – have already taken part in debates on Channel 4 and ITV which have seen the would-be prime ministers taking primetime pot shots at each other.
The exit of Tugendhat from the contest was not unexpected, with the Tonbridge and Malling MP trailing behind rivals in the bid for Tory MP backers.
He had addressed his likely fate head-on earlier, dismissing any suggestion that he would drop out.
The PA News agency understands that at the behind-closed-doors hustings organised by the backbench 1922 Committee, he told MPs that it had been suggested to him that he should step aside and back another candidate.
He said: “It will come as no surprise that some have suggested I could leave with a job as well. But my view is clear. It is not for me to make that decision – it is for you.”
Tweeting after the contest, he said: “Although it wasn’t to be today, I am immensely proud of the positive vision we put forward for our country.
“Thank you to all those who supported me and believed in #ACleanStart.
“This is only the beginning!”
Mordaunt’s record in office came in for further attack from Trevelyan on LBC Radio this morning.
Asked about Mordaunt’s grasp of details, Ms Trevelyan said: “We all do our jobs in different ways.
“Understandably, perhaps, now it’s clear, Penny has for the last few months spent some of her time focused on preparing her leadership campaign, for which I have utmost respect, that’s how this system works.”
Trevelyan added: “There have been a number of times when she hasn’t been available, which would have been useful, and other ministers have picked up the pieces.”
But former minister Harriet Baldwin, an ally of Mordaunt, said: “Having worked with Penny Mordaunt for a number of years, I can confirm this is not true.
“She is one of the most hard-working ministers and constituency MPs I know. I look forward to Penny continuing to put forward her positive vision for Britain.”
Cabinet minister Kit Malthouse said he expects the Tories to pull together in a “spirit of harmony and love” after the leadership battle.
“All political parties are standing coalitions and the Conservative Party is the same,” he told Sky News.
“A vigorous exchange of ideas, in what is a challenging time for the country, should be expected when you are talking about such important issues and the leadership of a G7 nation.
“If it was just a polite agreement and consensus across the board, there wouldn’t be much point in having a competition at all.”
Malthouse has not publicly declared his support for any of the candidates to succeed Johnson.
A series of votes among Tory MPs this week will narrow the field down to a final two, who will then face a summer of campaigning for the support of party members in a final vote.
The new leader will be announced on September 5 and is expected to become prime minister the following day.
Sunak said that if he is successful his first foreign trip will be to Kyiv to stress the UK’s continued support for Ukraine in its fight against the Russian invasion.
He told The Sun: “I will reinforce our policy of total support for Ukraine that Boris has so ably led.”
But Mordaunt said her campaign has the support of 10 Ukrainian MPs.
Meanwhile, Truss seized on analysis by the Centre for Economics and Business Research which suggested that tax revenues in 2024/25 will be around £60 billion more than the Office for Budget Responsibility estimates, partly due to the impact of high inflation.
A spokeswoman for Truss said: “The CEBR analysis shows that there is money for tax cuts whilst still bringing debt down.”
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Please please let it be Liz…she’s so brutally dim it would be the nail in the coffin for British exceptionalism
@David cotter: Or perhaps more accurately, English supremacism. Truss is certainly the one Labour would like to see as PM as she’s indeed considered easiest to beat, but I doubt it’ll be her. She’s even managing to outdo the Maybot so far.
70 million people living in the Uk and these guys are all they can come up with as potential leaders… the USA is even worse … we should be grateful in this country no matter what your political persuasion that most of our our politicians would burn this bunch… waiting for the SF/leftist bots to jump in .. don’t care …
@Kevin50: What are saying Kevin, our politicians are better liars than theirs?
It seems you definitely believe that you and your fellow FFGG-bots are better than the alternative voices.
@Kevin50: The main issue is FPTP – this has two major problems, firstly that a relatively small section of the electorate can vote in a sizable majority, and secondly that a clown like Johnson is able to seize power.
Ireland has thankfully been able to implement an updated and proportional version of parliamentary democracy in the form of transferable votes, but the UK, having once been progressive in terms of democracy (but that was in the 18th century) now has a hopelessly outdated system.
Fintan O’Toole from the Irish Times outlined this problem and its effects (e.g. Brexit) a few days ago in an interview with German paper Zeit (the US indeed has the same issue). I’ve made a translation if you wish to have a look: https://twitter.com/mickstaubyn/status/1548724723873468417
@Mick Tobin: Spot on. The two major pitfalls for democracy seem to be FPTP and two party systems – they tend to go together.
I’ve heard this arrangement defended on the basis that a replaceable dictator gets things done while still being removable in the long run if necessary.
That sounds good, until you notice that they tend to do extremely sub-optimal things from time to time.
@Steve O’Hara-Smith: They go together indeed. And even if both parties tend to by and large coalesce to the centre like a Nash equilibrium, the big drawback is the propensity when in power to destroy the achievements of the previous government.
In Ireland people will probably say, but it’s the same here with FF/FG, but it isn’t with SF polling close and even beyond. In the UK it’d be unthinkable for the LibDems to be polling close to Labour.
We should probably count our blessings, not least because with coalitions, there’s a good likelihood of continuity of administration rather than one party taking over and making its mark by undoing what the other party did, as in the UK.
@Mick Tobin: Yeah, I grew up in the UK during the Heath/Wilson alternation era the destructive reversals were obvious to a largely apolitical child.
I recall writing an essay at school proposing that political parties should be banned because politicians were prevented even considering the best answer to a problem if that answer was in conflict with the party ideology.
@Cobh Rebel Tour Mccarthy: these FFFG bots you mention appear to have a more articulate and intelligent AI driving them than the shinbots. SF really do need to invest more in their bot AI.
@Cobh Rebel Tour Mccarthy: have never voted for FFG and never will, but why are people so insistent on using bot like this? You know that if it’s a bot, it’s a bit useless trying to score points against it and addressing it like it’s a person?
When did ‘bot’ replace the word ‘troll’ as an inaccurate term for ‘someone I disagree with’?
@Megan Finnegan Ward: It never did, thats not what a troll is.
@Gary Kearney: Yes Gary, that’s what the ‘an inaccurate term’ bit means. Cheers
- “Badenoch repeatedly tried to interrupt, saying: Penny, I was just telling the truth. I am telling the truth.”
No she wasn’t. As equalities minister under Theresa May, Mordaunt was in charge of a consultation with healthcare professionals to gauge their opinion as to whether the process for people to legally alter their gender should change. And ultimately it was not changed.
This whole so-called ‘woke wars’ stuff is just getting in the way. It’s seemingly this electoral goldmine that some politicians are eager to tap into for cheap points. If ‘woke’ is simply about human rights and fair treatment, then fair enough, but some people are trying to make it into this ‘war on our values’, while it’s probably more useful to focus on the value of our money.
That said, I’ve got a feeling it’s going to be Sunak after all.
Sunak’s excuse for his wife declaring “non-dom” is that she is from a foreign country. Every body knows that they have to pay tax in the country in which they live. This alone, should make him unelectable. She knew, he knew, that they were tax dodging. None of them are up to the job.
And when this is all over we’re expected to believe it’s a united Conservative party.
@Great White Hope: Absolutely, team spirit and all that. A good healthy airing in the competition and then they can all close ranks squarely behind the new leader. One for all and all for one – Rah Rah and all that.
Now would you like shares in a bridge project…
Let’s get this straight, the two leading contenders are saying that they can’t behave themselves in public debate.
In other words they have declared their incompetence for the job they seek.
Hope Truss wins. We need another Boris to further push Scottish independence and Irish unity.
What a bunch of steaming hot excrement.
So there is £60 billion surplus due to high inflation, inflation which impacts the low income earners and less well of a lot harder. But Truss sees it as a tax break for higher earners. This is also the political outlook of FFG.
Eliminating candidates one at a time. It doesn’t seem like they’re using a first past the post system. Sure that would be the best wouldn’t it?
@Darren Byrne: FPTP is what they use for elections. Choosing a party leader is up to the party, they can draw straws if they like. Rumour has it that the real choosing happens over lunches in London clubs and the rest is just for show – except that the votes are binding.
It is interesting that they choose not to use FPTP internally but the system they’re using would be more fun if they out sourced it to the producers of “The Big Brother House”.
Now
We See How Borris won the Last time
Bookies have Truss ahead of Mordaunt to become PM. Sunak still favourite.
@Irish Opinion: If Sunak was the winner would he be the first ever Son of Immigrant parents to be the PM?
The only candidates are people who can’t be trusted to not squabble like kids over who gets to run a country.
Damn it I was so looking forward to seeing these greats on Sky TV….
As if Mr not held a cabinet position, sounds like a character in a German childrens book Tugenhat was actually going to win, it’s a surprise he lasted that long in the race
have your say