Growing numbers of Tories believe Boris Johnson will face a no confidence vote as soon as next week after a drip-drip of letters demanding he quit.
Ex-leader William Hague today declared the Prime Minister is in “real trouble” and Tory MPs are “moving towards having a ballot”, “either next week or around the end of June”.
Reports emerged today that Tory whips and even the Prime Minister himself has been calling round wavering MPs in a desperate ‘save Boris’ campaign.
It comes after almost 30 Tory MPs publicly demanded the PM resign and several more publicly criticised him over Sue Gray’s Partygate report, while stopping short of a no confidence letter.
It takes 54 letters to the back bench 1922 Committee to trigger a no confidence vote. Most believe he will survive - though when Theresa May survived hers in 2018 she ended up quitting months later.
Grinning 1922 chairman Sir Graham Brady only fuelled speculation when he told ITV coyishly: “It’s a confidential process and I will retain my discretion and I’ll say nothing more at the moment.”
Asked if he had a busy few days ahead, he replied: “I’m always busy!”
One-time ally Andrea Leadsom today accused Boris Johnson of “unacceptable failings of leadership” as the Prime Minister’s premiership plunged into fresh peril.
And another MP submitted a letter calling for a vote of no confidence in the PM.
John Stevenson said: "Sadly, the Prime Minister appears unwilling to bring matters to a head and submit himself to such a vote.
“Therefore, the only option is for the Conservative MPs to facilitate a vote of confidence. I have already taken the appropriate action."
The number of Tories publicly calling for Boris Johnson to go has now passed the number who’d broken cover against Theresa May when her vote was triggered in 2018.
One Tory MP told the Mirror a vote “feels like it could be next week”, though it was tricky to say because MPs are “the most untrustworthy electorate going”.
Another MP, a former minister, said: “I suspect with 28 declared letters, a vote of no confidence is nailed on sooner rather than later.”
The source suggested there was wider disquiet amongst MPs about Rishi Sunak ’s spending plans, which they branded as “expensive” and “not Conservative”.
A third MP predicted a vote would come next week if the target of 54 letters was hit this week, as MPs are away from Parliament during the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.
They said “They wouldn’t want to have a vote like this with 100 or so MPs out of the country and a 60% turnout - it would be a disaster.
“I think it won’t be this week even if we hit 54 letters today.”
The MP said there were questions about how Sir Graham will choose to act if the 54 target is hit during the Queen’s Jubilee weekend.
They added: “The normal process is Sir Graham tells the PM, then announces.
“The question is, does he sit on it and not tell the Prime Minister until next week, or does he tell the Prime Minister and not announce it publicly for days?”
Another MP, asked how they thought things would pan out, replied bluntly: "No idea... given up predicting".
Labour ’s deputy leader Angela Rayner slammed claims Boris Johnson himself was ringing round his MPs to shore up support.
She said: “This Prime Minister has been reduced to desperately phoning around his mutinous MPs offering out baubles in a doomed attempt to save his own skin.
“His dishevelled Government is asleep at the wheel at the very time that their rank incompetence has left us with the highest inflation in the G7 and a cost of living crisis that is worsening every day.
“The Prime Minister should get off the blower and instead get a grip on the passport delays and travel chaos that is threatening to blight the Jubilee Weekend for so many.”
Ex-leader Lord Hague said the Gray report’s aftermath was "one of those sort of slow-fuse explosions in politics".
He told Times Radio: A lot of people misread it really, the events of last week as meaning the trouble is over, Boris is free and that's actually not the mood in the Conservative Party, which is very, very troubled about the contents of that report.
"So I think the Conservative Party will need to resolve this one way or another, obviously because to be an effective party they either need to rally behind the Prime Minister they've got, or they need to decide to force him out.
"I think they're moving towards either next week or around the end of June, they are moving towards having a ballot, it looks like that."
One MP told i News - which reported the PM’s ring round - "This, frankly, bollocks from No 10, saying the PM is ‘safe now’ - he has got well over 100 people who think he should go”.
Once a vote is triggered, Boris Johnson will have to face down a vote of no-confidence from his own MPs.
Mathematically, he should see off any such vote without much of a problem.
Including himself, he has 138 Tory MPs on the “government payroll” - that means they’re either ministers, whips or Parliamentary Private Secretaries (PPS) - the junior “bag carriers” who assist more senior ministers.
They would be expected to back the PM in any vote of confidence.
To cling on, Boris Johnson needs the votes of 50% of his MPs plus one. With 359 Tory MPs in total, that means he needs 180 MPs to back him in total. So he only has to convince 42 backbench MPs who aren't already on the payroll in order to scrape through.
In December 2018, Theresa May survived a confidence vote by 200 to 117 - a majority of 83 - meaning she was safe from another challenge for at least a year.
But she came under huge pressure in the following months, and resigned of her own accord the following May.
Andrea Thorpe, chairman of Maidstone and the Weald Conservative Association said: "I do think we need firm leadership, a firmer leadership now."
She told the BBC : "But there's more to it than party gate now, it's the cost of living, it's the fact that we've still got the National Insurance rise, we've still got VAT on fuel.
“All of these, these aren't Conservative values and we're not getting lower taxes, we're just in this state of, the whole country seems to, the police aren't working, the NHS isn't working and I think that's the general feeling I'm getting."
Mr Johnson faces an anxious Jubilee Bank Holiday as Tory MPs mull his fate over Partygate.
Allies are desperately trying to shore up Mr Johnson’s leadership as celebrations to mark the Queen’s 70 years on the throne begin.
The PM is expected to attend a string of royal commemorations in the coming days as his fate increasingly hangs in the balance.
Arts Minister Lord Stephen Parkinson, who was an adviser to Theresa May when she faced a confidence vote, insisted: "There's an awful lot of speculation about the numbers of letters that go in and past experience shows, not just then but before, the only person that knows how many letters that have been sent in is the chairman of the 1922 Committee.
“It's pretty pointless to speculate about the numbers before then, it's a distraction from the work of government and in government we're getting on with making sure that we grow the economy to help with the cost of living."
Former MP Justine Greening warned: “The reality is that all prime ministers ultimately either have to get a grip or get out and that is a political rule that even Boris Johnson will need to follow.”
