The MP for Kingswood, Chris Skidmore, has said he will not stand in the race to be the next Prime Minister. The contest to decide who will take over as the leader of the Conservative party is set to get underway soon, and the winner will replace Boris Johnson as PM.
So far, 11 MPs have declared that they will put themselves forward as candidates - but Skidmore has announced that he will not. In a slightly bizarre video posted on Twitter today (July 11), which started with the MP standing there without realising the filming had begun and ended with him cutting the clip short to answer a phone call, Skidmore said he would focus his efforts on pushing for the government to tackle the climate crisis.
"This is a critical moment for the country and this is a critical moment for the Conservative party, which is why today I can announce that I won't be standing as leader of the Conservative party. Instead, I'm going to stand up for our commitments that we've made on the environment and climate change," he said.
Read more: Kingswood Tory MP Chris Skidmore calls out cabinet ministers who are yet to resign
Skidmore has said that his support for any of the candidates will depend on their support for environmental issues. To become the next leader of the Party, the MPs that are running will need the backing of at least 20 other Conservative MPs.
And Skidmore continued in his video: "I'm calling on all Conservative candidates to set out their priorities on the environment and net zero, and indeed my own personal support for the final candidate in the race will depend on that commitment to that cause."
In an article published in the Telegraph today and co-written with former Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith, Skidmore wrote that ditching climate commitments like net zero would be like "digging our electoral grave" for the Conservatives. Voting for the next leader of the party is set to get underway soon, once the Conservatives elect the members of their 1922 committee tonight - the committee which is responsible for deciding the rules of a leadership race.
Candidates will include Rishi Sunak, Sajid Javid and Liz Truss, among others. There will be a series of votes which will whittle the list down to just two people, which could happen by Thursday next week, according to the 1922 Committee's joint executive secretary Bob Blackman.
Once that happens, Conservative Party members across the country will be allowed to vote for which of the two remaining candidates they would like to win. This means there could be a new Prime Minister by September.
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