Summary
It’s been another busy day in Westminster, as two of the Tory leadership candidates were defeated in the ballot. Here is a round-up of the day’s top news stories:
- Rishi Sunak has taken an early lead in the Conservative leadership contest, as Jeremy Hunt and Nadhim Zahawi were knocked out of the race to replace Boris Johnson.
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Penny Mordaunt launched her campaign to lead the Conservative party by vowing to overhaul Boris Johnson’s “failed model of leadership” and comparing the outgoing prime minister to Paul McCartney as she set out plans to dramatically slim down the cabinet.
- She would beat all other candidates in the Tory leadership contest in the final ballot of member - very easily, a YouGov poll for the Times suggests.
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Suella Braverman backer Steve Baker has insisted the attorney general will stay in the race to succeed Boris Johnson, despite only just clearing the minimum number of votes required to continue in the contest.
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Jeremy Hunt has backed Rishi Sunak to be the next prime minister. The former health secretary lost out in his bid to replace Boris Johnson earlier today after failing to get the required 30 nominations.
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Keir Starmer used prime minister’s questions to attack the tax affairs of Tory leadership candidates, while Boris Johnson insisted that while he had not wanted to depart No 10, he was nonetheless doing so “with my head held high”.
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Boris Johnson’s ministers have “given up on governing”, opposition parties have claimed after Priti Patel pulled out of an MPs’ questioning session with minimal notice, while a junior health minister was sent to explain a crisis in ambulance services.
- Sir Mike Penning has told Sky News that he has resigned as a Conservative party vice chair so that he can campaign openly for Penny Mordaunt. He says hers is the campaign with momentum.
- In an interview with Katy Balls for the Spectator, Liz Truss, the foreign secretary and Tory leadership candidate, has explained how she would pay for tax cuts. She would repay Covid debt over a longer period, she said
- Only 11% of voters would recognise a picture of Penny Mordaunt, the international trade minister and Tory leadership candidate, according to a poll by Savanta ComRes.
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Patrick Vallance has warned MPs that the world is about to be plunged into even deeper turmoil than it was during the Covid pandemic because of the impact of climate change.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, for today. You can follow all the latest UK politics news here. Goodnight.
Iain Duncan Smith has written in the Daily Telegraph, outlining his support for Liz Truss.
He says the foreign secretary has the “unshakable resolve to get the necessary but difficult reforms through Whitehall to get our economy motoring”, and notes that while she didn’t support Brexit she “has been committed to making the most of our new-found freedoms from the European Union”.
The former Conservative party leader also praised Truss for her stance on China and Russia.
