When Tory MPs gathered on Wednesday night to hear Rishi Sunak address them for the first time since their worst election defeat, they were told to be on their best behaviour. The new chairman of the 1922 Committee, Bob Blackman, made clear to colleagues that they ought to behave respectfully – the last thing they needed was more bickering. “The suggestion was if you are angry, this wasn’t the right place to show it,” explains an attender.
In the Q&A session that followed Sunak’s speech apologising over losses, loyalty was the buzzword – particularly in reference to Suella Braverman, the former home secretary. She has been out and about recently, criticising Sunak and the Pride flag, and has not ruled out defecting to the Reform party.
But while most Tory MPs are playing nice for the time being, the question is how long this uneasy truce can last. This week, comments made by Kemi Badenoch at a shadow cabinet meeting criticising Sunak over parts of the election campaign were quickly leaked to the press. That the party cannot even agree on the timings for a leadership contest doesn’t bode well either.
The elephant in the room is how long Sunak will be willing to stick around. The former prime minister has suggested he will stay in place, but MPs suspect this is an offer with limits. “He is not going to want to be leader of the opposition for months on end,” one MP told me.
Plenty of Tory grandees have already chimed in with talk of the need to “take our time” rather than rush into a messy contest when wounds are still raw. The “go long” crowd are drawing inspiration from the 2005 Conservative leadership contest, when Michael Howard announced his intention to go but stuck around for several months to allow the party to regroup. That year’s party conference was seen as the starting gun on the contest, with every contender giving a 20-minute speech. David Cameron emerged as the frontrunner.
However, few in the party believe a young, Cameron-esque candidate will emerge to shake up the contest this time around. “Sadly we are not in a David Cameron moment, when someone electrifies the race, so there isn’t much point waiting,” says a colleague. “We know who the candidates are, we should get on with it. A lot of people who use the phrase ‘go long’ without any specific timing, it’s just an emotive reaction.”
The “go now” crowd argues that a sweep of political events requires a response – and that should come from a new leader, otherwise others such as Nigel Farage will take up the space. This group tends to be more positive about the election result, seeing Starmer’s huge majority won on a comparatively small vote share as evidence that his government could be less stable than it seems. Uniting behind a leader quickly could pay off should the prime minister slip up.
Until the rules have been confirmed, don’t expect any candidate to declare. “What a lot of the frontrunners have realised is that the party is hurting and not that receptive to manoeuvres,” says a Tory old-timer. There’s also a strategic point – if the contest is very long, candidates will want to bide their time rather than lose focus by going all out in the first few weeks.
Yet unofficial leadership teams are forming, ready to move when the time comes. Pitches are being drawn up. What nearly everyone in the party can agree on is that they need to reunite the right and then find a pitch to the country. “We need to win back voters from Reform – then appeal to voters in centre,” says one senior Tory. “Whichever candidate is best placed to do that will win.”
Whether any one candidate can do both remains to be seen. Among the One Nation wing, Victoria Atkins or Tom Tugendhat are seen as the most likely contenders, but with the party wanting to move right there are concerns that this is not their time. Inevitably, some candidates will stand just to ensure a big shadow job when they get knocked out.
Braverman and Robert Jenrick will probably focus on ways to win back voters lost to Reform, but that could isolate those MPs worried about winning back Tory voters who have gone to the Liberal Democrats. Notably, Jenrick is now seen as the likely candidate of the right. “Suella has blown herself up with these attacks – the mood at the moment is to try to be loyal and unifying and she has done the opposite,” says a colleague. “It would be good for us if she defected to Reform and became Farage’s problem.”
It’s why for now at least the contest is viewed as Badenoch’s to lose, on the grounds that she sits on the right but has supporters in the centre. A member of the 2017 intake, she is also seen as a bit fresher than some colleagues. As one MP puts it, the former home secretary Priti Patel “could be a strong contender but she might be too much of a face from the past”.
Those pushing to “go long” with the contest tend to be those worried that a decision now could see a candidate on the right triumph. But the truth is, whether the Tories have the contest now or in a year, the same debates are going to need to take place. Time can put off a clash – but it can’t stop the inevitable fight the party has to have. The risk of going long is that no one changes their position but the infighting drags on – and the party looks to voters to be more focused on navel-gazing than providing opposition.
Katy Balls is the Spectator’s political editor
