Tory leadership race

Wednesday

Steerpike

Another Mordaunt Twitter blunder

Oh dear. It seems that the Mordaunt camp has done it again. Just hours after suggesting that Rishi Sunak or Liz Truss would ‘murder’ the Tory party if they were elected, another suspect #PM4PM tweet has been doing the rounds. It’s about the Trade minister’s ability to win a general election, citing a YouGov poll of 18-19 July of Tory party members. Team Mordaunt has released a graphic which shows Penny on 28 points compared to Sunak and Truss on 17 and 15 respectively. Separately, screenshots of a document are also being shared among MPs by Mordaunt’s supporters, again referring to the YouGov poll labelled 18-19 July. Unfortunately, that poll

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The next PM must be ready for Putin

Westminster is understandably obsessed with the question of who makes the final two of the Tory leadership race, but today has also brought a reminder of the crises that the new Prime Minister will have to deal with from day one.  The European Commission is calling on all EU member states to cut gas use by 15 per cent to prepare for supply cuts from Russia through Nord Stream 1, which reopens tomorrow. With the pipeline only flowing at limited levels, and the heatwave leading to higher energy use than usual, Germany will not be able to lay in stores for the winter. This means that Vladimir Putin will constantly try

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Will it be a Truss vs Sunak final?

The last stage of the parliamentary rounds of the leadership contest is here. This afternoon, MPs will vote to decide which two out of Penny Mordaunt, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak progresses to the final round, in which they are whittled down to one by the party membership. The new leader will be announced at the beginning of September. Although Mordaunt came out in second place in yesterday’s ballot, there is a growing consensus among MPs that the most likely result today is a Truss vs Sunak final. The fact that Kemi Badenoch was knocked out in the fourth ballot means that the right of the party ought to be

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

Kemi Badenoch will be the new Tory leader’s secret weapon

There was an unmistakable whiff of an Addams Family portrait about the cabinet photocall that marked the final gathering of Boris Johnson’s top team. Surrounding the departing Prime Minister were many ministers who will have suspected that they are not going to be in the same ministerial positions, or perhaps any ministerial position, when 10 Downing Street is under new management. To what extent, for example, can Nadhim Zahawi put together any kind of economic agenda, given his disastrous first fortnight as chancellor? His first few days in office saw him pledge an arbitrary tax-cutting timetable before his leadership hopes promptly collapsed amid reports that his own tax affairs were under

Douglas Murray

The ruthless inefficiency of the Tory party

It is hard to love the Conservative party. But one reason it has at least always commanded a certain amount of respect is thanks to its reputation for ruthless efficiency. Personally I have found that reputation to be only half true. It is true that the party can be ruthless, but only in being ruthlessly inefficient. Look at the mechanism by which it removed the Prime Minister who brought it its largest majority since Margaret Thatcher. True, Boris Johnson had his faults. But did the party not know these in advance? Why was it not able to add the stabilisers so obviously needed to keep a rickety, not to mention rackety,

Steerpike Steerpike

Mordaunt: Truss or Sunak will ‘murder’ us

Throughout the leadership race, Penny Mordaunt has sought to portray herself as the cleanest candidate of them all. She has bemoaned the ‘toxic politics’ and ‘smears’ of others and bewailed how ‘this contest is in danger of slipping into something else’. She, by contrast, has pledged to run a ‘truly clean campaign’ and ‘committed to a clean start for our party’ – away from all from the attacks, lies and backstabbing of the past. Mordaunt even told Steerpike’s colleague Isabel Hardman on The Spectator podcast just yesterday that: I have conducted my campaign in a way that I think is needed and has been the right thing to do. Now

Matthew Lynn Matthew Lynn

Soaring inflation could tank Rishi Sunak’s Tory leadership bid

Wages are rising. The economy is growing. The stock market is on the way up, and exports are booming. As he prepares for a long summer trying to persuade the membership of the Conservative party to make him prime minister, Rishi Sunak probably wishes he could be transported to some parallel universe where he could boast about his record as Chancellor. The trouble is, he is stuck with this one: and the news is relentlessly bad. This morning, inflation was up yet again, hitting a 40-year-high of 9.4 per cent. Yesterday, it was real wages falling sharply, as workers’ income failed to keep up with rising prices. Over the next

Steerpike Steerpike

Penny attacks Truss over China

Dividing lines and clear blue water –  in any election it’s crucial for candidates to find and exploits the distinctions between themselves and their rivals. Could China perhaps be one? It was the subject which Liz Truss chose to quiz Rishi Sunak about on Sunday and is seen by allies of the former as a weakness for the latter. The Foreign Secretary is keen to appear more hawkish than her rival; under Sunak’s Chancellorship the Treasury tried to restart multiple high-level financial dialogues with Beijing. And it’s not just Truss pushing this line, for Penny Mordaunt has now decided to jump on board the China train. She declared last night

Robert Peston Robert Peston

Kemi Badenoch’s role in the Tory leadership race isn’t over yet

Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leadership contest’s Emma Raducanu, finally lost momentum. She put on just one vote to secure 59 backers, and is out. But that’s not the end of her story in this battle to find Britain’s next prime minister. Where she and her supporters now place their votes will determine which two Tory MPs are whittled to one by the votes of 160,000 ordinary members of the Conservative party. It would be extraordinary if Badenoch threw her weight behind Penny Mordaunt, given her highly personal charge that Mordaunt as equalities minister was too liberal in her policy towards trans people. It’s a charge that Mordaunt has rejected, but there’s

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

The Online Safety Bill won’t survive the Tory contest

At yesterday’s Spectator hustings for the final three Tory leadership candidates, each one of them ended up committing to overhauling the controversial Online Safety Bill. The Spectator and many Conservative MPs have expressed serious concerns about the impact of this legislation, drawn up with the best of intentions, on free speech. Each acknowledged that there was a real problem with the current drafting, which creates a new definition of ‘legal but harmful’. Kemi Badenoch, who was knocked out yesterday, had described this as cracking down on free speech to prevent ‘hurt feelings’, which is something none of them fully accepted. But they all saw that ‘legal but harmful’ as it

Stephen Daisley Stephen Daisley

The Union is in trouble whoever wins the Tory leadership race

It’s not a question that has enjoyed much play in the Tory leadership election but it’s a pretty important one: Should the United Kingdom continue to exist? That is essentially what Isabel Hardman tried to tease out of the three remaining candidates in The Spectator hustings, which comprised separate head-to-head interviews. Penny Mordaunt and Liz Truss were interviewed in person at The Spectator offices while Rishi Sunak spoke to Isabel down the line. None of the candidates had any great insight into how to preserve the UK. None broached fundamental questions, such as the inherent flaws of a devolved settlement that allows the Scottish government to use taxpayers’ money to

Tuesday

James Kirkup

The Conservative party has ceased to be serious

I’m not sure that the Conservative party wants to win elections. Tom Tugendhat was knocked out of the leadership contest on Monday, and Liz Truss is now the bookies’ favourite to be the next Prime Minister. Any party that thinks the latter beats the former cannot say it is serious. There are several reasons for Conservatives to ignore me on this topic. First, I’m not a Conservative. Second, Tugendhat and I are friends. Third, I take a view of party politics that seems to be utterly out of fashion these days. That view is that politics works better when parties try to win the other side’s votes. When Conservatives pursue

Coffee House

Kemi Badenoch eliminated

Kemi Badenoch has been eliminated from the Tory leadership contest. Rishi Sunak came first with 118 Tory MPs backing him; Penny Mordaunt was second on 92; Liz Truss came third on 86. Badenoch was supported by 59 MPs. Refresh this page to read the latest: 5.15 p.m. Where will Kemi’s supporters go now? Now that Kemi Badenoch has been eliminated from the Tory leadership race, the big question is who will her supporters back? Leo Docherty’s endorsement of Liz Truss suggests that at least some of Kemi’s supporters will opt for Truss over the other leadership contenders: 4.20 p.m. Kemi says thanks 4.20 p.m. Kemi out. What now? With Kemi Badenoch eliminated, who will make the final cut?

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Tory leadership race is at its most unpredictable

The fast pace of this Tory leadership contest means that MPs are voting again in just a couple of hours. Today is the most unpredictable day of this contest so far. There are all sorts of cross-currents swirling around Westminster: some Tugendhat supporters’ primary objective is to block Truss now their candidate is out of the contest. But there are also those who aren’t fans of Penny Mordaunt – like Anne-Marie Trevelyan, who ran on Tugendhat’s ticket as his deputy, who yesterday said Mordaunt ‘left other ministers to pick up the pieces’ to plan her leadership bid. How this all balances out is hard to judge. At the same time, Kemi Badenoch is

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Is Kemi Badenoch on the way out?

It’s the day of the penultimate ballot in the parliamentary stage of the Tory leadership contest. The four candidates left in the contest are Rishi Sunak, 115 votes, Penny Mordaunt, 82 votes, Liz Truss, 71 votes, and Kemi Badenoch, 58 votes. Voting to whittle the four to three begins this afternoon with the result announced at 3 p.m. But as last night’s results showed, the race is wide open. The only certainty right now is that if Badenoch is knocked out tonight, she won’t be out of the spotlight for long The general consensus among MPs is that Sunak is on course to reach the final two – but when

Steerpike Steerpike

Is Kemi flip-flopping on net zero?

Ah Kemi Badenoch: the Saffron Walden slayer of shibboleths who has electrified the Tory leadership race. The former equalities minister has gone from near-unknown to standard-bearer of the right during the past fortnight. She is now seeking to pull off a shock upset and overhaul Liz Truss in the MPs’ ballot today. Much of Badenoch’s appeal comes from her perceived ability to say home truths and communicate her views clearly and coherently. So it’s all the more of a shame then that Badenoch appears to lack such candour when it comes to the thorny issue of the current government target of net zero carbon emissions by 2050. When she launched

Coffee House

Who’s backing whom? Sunak still ahead

Only two Tory MPs will make it to the membership for a final election – which is why the number of endorsements matters. On the first round, Rishi Sunak got the support of 88 MPs, followed by Penny Mordaunt on 67, Liz Truss on 50, Kemi Badenoch on 40, Tom Tugendhat on 37 and Suella Braverman on 32. On the second round, Braverman was eliminated as Sunak came top again with 101 MPs then Mordaunt and Truss on 83 and 64 each, followed by Badenoch on 49 and Tugendhat on 32. On the third round, Tugendhat was eliminated as Sunak got 115 votes, followed by Mordaunt on 82, Truss on

Thursday

James Forsyth

Where do the Tories go from here?

The hardest thing for any political party to achieve is renewal in government. The Tories have managed it twice since they came to power in 2010. In 2016 and 2019 they changed leader – and tack – to adjust to new political realities. Their effort in 2019 was more successful, winning them their biggest majority since 1987. At both points, it was obvious that a shift on Brexit was what was required. What about this time? The answer isn’t so clear. In some ways this leadership race is the first discussion the Conservatives have had about their ideological direction since the 2005 leadership contest between David Cameron and David Davis

Martin Vander Weyer Martin Vander Weyer

My Tory leadership race fantasy game

‘Black swan’ theory, developed by the writer Nassim Nicholas Taleb, refers to unexpected events that have extreme consequences but are rationalised afterwards by pundits who say ‘That was always going to happen.’ Covid was a big one; Putin’s war on Ukraine another. It’s in the nature of global events that there’s always a dark-feathered disruptor lurking somewhere, waiting to make its presence felt. Right now, it just might be hidden in reports of protestors in Zhengzhou, capital of China’s Henan province, demanding their money back from four local banks that suspended withdrawals in April. Runs on small banks are not unknown in China; nor is embezzlement by corrupt managers. The

George Osborne

Boris’s final days in No. 10

‘So what did he say?’ I asked the ministerial friend who went to tell Boris last week he had to resign. ‘Well, he told me a long story about a relative of his who got caught up in a planning dispute, barricaded himself inside his house and the police had to come in force to drag him out. I think it means he’s not going quietly.’ At one level, politics is unpredictable; but enduring political rules apply. Boris told me years ago that while he wasn’t a team player, he could be a good team leader. For all his infectious optimism, it turns out that’s not possible. Downing Street will