Senior figures in the Conservative Party are urging it to unite behind prime minister Rishi Sunak and swerve a mutiny threatened by supporters of former leader Boris Johnson, who has quit as an MP.
Michael Howard, former leader of the party, said Tories should “put all our recent turmoil behind us” and back Mr Sunak in advance of next year’s UK general election. Grant Shapps, a senior cabinet member who was once close to Mr Johnson, said the “world has moved on” from the former leader’s time. “[We] don’t miss the drama,” he said.
Mr Johnson resigned in anger from his Uxbridge and South Ruislip constituency in west London on Friday at what he derided as a “kangaroo court” committee of MPs that was expected to suspend him for misleading parliament about his knowledge of illegal parties at Downing Street during Covid lockdown.
Mr Johnson also took aim at the performance of the government led by Mr Sunak, against whom he holds a grudge for helping to topple him as prime minister last July. It subsequently emerged over the weekend that Mr Johnson was also furious at Mr Sunak after several of the former prime minister’s nominees for peerages were blocked last week.
Mr Johnson blames Mr Sunak for trimming the list of some of his supporters, although Mr Shapps denied on Sunday this had happened. Several UK news outlets also published denials of interference from sources close to Mr Sunak, who say the list originally proposed by Mr Johnson was finalised by an independent nominations body.
The smouldering row has resulted in major consequences both for Mr Johnson, whose political career appears to be over for now, and for Mr Sunak, who now leads a party riven once again with rancour and division after only a brief period of respite earlier in the year.
The most pressing issue for Mr Sunak is the prospect of having to fight at least three byelections before the July recess following the resignations of Mr Johnson and also two of his closest acolytes, Nadine Dorries and Nigel Adams, who also quit as MPs after their names were removed from Mr Johnson’s honours list.
Supporters of Mr Johnson warned more resignations could happen, but so far they have failed to materialise, suggesting Mr Sunak may not face a large-scale mutiny.
Pressure will be still heaped upon Mr Sunak if the Conservatives lose all three of the coming byelections, as it will further undermine his diminishing argument that the party still has a path to victory next year under his leadership.
Mr Johnson’s seat was in a marginal constituency heavily targeted by Labour. Had he, as expected, been suspended for more than 10 days by the privileges committee investigating “partygate”, Mr Johnson faced the prospect of a recall byelection and the humiliating prospect of being unseated anyway. He is now seen as having jumped before he was pushed.
Former culture minister Ms Dorries’s Mid Bedfordshire constituency, in a rural belt north of Luton, has a much larger Conservative majority but is being targeted by the Liberal Democrats. If that party flips it, it will buttress expectations that the Lib Dems could make enough of a comeback next year to return to government in coalition with Labour, in a hung parliament.
Mr Adams’s Selby and Ainsty constituency, east of Leeds, is also in Labour’s sights. If the Conservatives lose there, it will severely damage Mr Sunak’s claims that he can maintain the party’s popularity in the north of England, which helped propel Mr Johnson to a resounding victory in the last general election in 2019.
The focus now moves on Monday to the publication by the privileges committee of the partygate report on Mr Johnson that sparked his resignation. If no more of his supporters jump ship, Mr Sunak may win his battle for influence with Mr Johnson, who will not be able to run again elsewhere without the leadership’s approval.
But it may prove be a pyrrhic victory for Mr Sunak, as the Conservative Party is likely to be weakened as an electoral force due to the damage the infighting will do to its image with a weary electorate that craves stability.
