A new Prime Minister to succeed Liz Truss will be announced within a week. Details of how they will be chosen have not been officially released.
Experts are saying that it will be MPs who decide and not grassroot members as before. But Sir Graham Brady has hinted that it could go to the Conservative membership.
The leadership contest that saw Liz Truss being chosen over Rishi Sunak lasted longer than her premiership, but the next contest looks set to be a lot shorter.
Read more: Liz Truss quits as Prime Minister after just weeks in the job - live updates
Liz Truss said in her resignation statement: "This morning I met the chairman of the 1922 Committee, Sir Graham Brady. We have agreed that there will be a leadership election to be completed within the next week. This will ensure that we remain on a path to deliver our fiscal plans and maintain our country's economic stability and national security. I will remain as Prime Minister until a successor has been chosen. "
Sir Graham Brady, who is chairman of the 1922 Committee and will be running the election, said there would be "more clarity" later on Thursday. He did say the new leader is expected to be in place by Friday, October 28.
He told reporters: "I have spoken to the party chairman Jake Berry and he has confirmed that it will be possible to conduct a ballot and conclude a leadership election by Friday the 28th of October. So we should have a new leader in place before the fiscal statement which will take place on the 31st."
He told reporters: "We are deeply conscious of the imperative and the national interest of resolving this clearly and quickly." Sir Graham said that there was a "broad consensus" that the contest should be held quickly.
Without a general election, the Conservatives will be on their third prime minister on the mandate won by Boris Johnson in December 2019. Live updates from another dramatic day in UK politics here.
Within moments of the announcement, Jeremy Hunt ruled himself. Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt, Ben Wallace and Suella Braverman are thought likely to run - while some even report that Boris Johnson, currently on holiday in the Caribbean, could bid for a shock return.
Meanwhile, the pressure to hold a General Election is growing. Sir Keir Starmer has demanded one "now", stressing that the Conservative Party has shown it "no longer has a mandate to govern".
He said: "After 12 years of Tory failure, the British people deserve so much better than this revolving door of chaos. In the last few years, the Tories have set record-high taxation, trashed our institutions and created a cost-of-living crisis. Now, they have crashed the economy so badly that people are facing £500 a month extra on their mortgages. The damage they have done will take years to fix."
Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has said a general election was a "democratic imperative" after the resignation of the Prime Minister.
"There are no words to describe this utter shambles adequately," the First Minister said on Twitter.
"It's beyond hyperbole - & parody. Reality tho is that ordinary people are paying the price. The interests of the Tory party should concern no-one right now. A general election is now a democratic imperative."
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