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A former Conservative chancellor has accused his party of forming a “circular firing squad”, comparing it to infighting in the Game of Thrones.
Nadhim Zahawi, who served briefly as chancellor in Boris Johnson’s cabinet, said members of his party still "want to tear chunks out of one another", something he said "breaks his heart".
Speaking to Times Radio, the former MP for Stratford-on-Avon said: "The greatest threat to our party today is we still want to tear chunks out of one another.
“People are not yet prepared to unite. That breaks my heart. Until we’re ready to unite and come together, we will be shouting into the void.
“This could be a moment in history where you could literally pinpoint the timeline where the Conservative Party fell apart".
He argued the party never reconciled in the wake of Brexit, adding: “We decided to form a circular firing squad whilst in government. Elements in my party who were very unhappy with Boris blamed him for the outcome of the referendum and then chose a different path.
A number of MPs in the Tory party formed a factional group known as the “five families” – made up of several smaller right wing groupings - when the previous government’s Rwanda legislation was being debated as part of an attempt to stage a rebellion.
Mr Zahawi continued: "We’re not some sort of mafia. We got to a stage where it felt more like Game of Thrones than being a responsible governing party.
“The factions got more and more extreme and more vicious towards one another. People looked at that and said, no, enough.
“These people don’t deserve to be lent our vote. If we don’t unite, if we don’t come together, then we’re going to be an irrelevance".
His remarks come as six candidates vie to take over from Rishi Sunak as leader, with party chiefs having put in place a “yellow card” system to prevent in-fighting during the contest.
Bob Blackman, chair of the 1922 Committee of backbench MPs, said he wants to see a “good clean contest”.
Unveiling the “yellow card system”, which will see candidates publicly reprimanded if they launch personal attacks on one another, Mr Blackman admitted that “constant backfighting and attacking was one of the contributing reasons why the party did so badly at the general election.”
“We are determined we will not tolerate that”, he added.
Conservative MPs will narrow down the number of candidates to just two in a series of votes in September and October, before the contest goes to a vote among Tory members to decide a winner by 2 November.
