The campaign has begun. The candidates are jostling for position and occasionally trading blows. It’s a tough fight that could turn nasty.
Don’t worry if you haven’t noticed this political battle. It’s not because you tuned out of Westminster news and missed a big announcement. This campaign isn’t for the public and it won’t be announced until next year, even though it’s well underway. It’s the contest to decide who leads the Conservative Party after it loses the general election.
In talking to Conservatives of various sorts since the New Year, I’m yet to find one who doesn’t consider that defeat to be the most likely outcome of the election. Of course, Rishi Sunak’s team are gamely insisting he can still pull off a surprise win, but when political “sources” base their predictions on “private polling” and “undecided voters”, it’s a sure sign they too know the game is up. After more than a decade of governing — with all the unpopular choices that involves — and with real wages falling, Westminster is betting firmly on an end to Tory rule.
In response, some Tories will just give up, and a few might even defect to Labour. Others will lose their seats in the Commons: even some Tories with what appear to be healthy majorities are quietly exploring career options outside Parliament. But in all but the most apocalyptic scenarios, there would be a couple of hundred Conservative MPs left in the Commons. They’d need a leader, and that person might lead the party back into government. Especially if — as Tory optimists hope — Prime Minister Keir Starmer lacks a reliable Commons majority and ends up relying on Scottish Nationalists and Liberal Democrats to govern.
And just as Conservative orthodoxy says defeat is a given, so it is assumed that Sunak would then depart the scene. Some think he’d walk away after an election defeat, perhaps returning to California and high finance. Others think he’d have to be removed, but see little difficulty in that; Tories show no mercy to leaders who fail.
Just ask Liz Truss. Watching Truss return to the stage this week to defend and excuse her disastrous premiership, many voters were left wondering “What on earth is she doing?” But, bizarre as it looked to ordinary people, the Truss return wasn’t entirely irrational. It was part of that undeclared battle for the leadership of a defeated Conservative Party. Truss is unlikely to be a candidate in that race (though never say never: she’s not exactly short of self-belief) but by again making the case for tax cuts uber alles, she’s trying to do two things. First, prepare the ground for blaming Sunak for losing the election, because he didn’t follow that Trussite agenda. Second, define the ground on which the next leadership contest should be run: the next Tory leader will have to say what he or she will do to cut taxes and fuel growth.
Boris Johnson is playing a similar game, likewise challenging Sunak over tax cuts the Treasury can’t afford. But he’s definitely running. Don’t believe anyone who tells you Johnson has given up on returning to power, that he wouldn’t hack the hard, boring work of leading the Tories in opposition. Few politicians ever stop dreaming of power, and Johnson is ambitious even by the standards of the tribe. For as long as there’s breath in his body he’ll wonder if something will turn up and allow him to have another crack at the top job. He has a network of big donors and grassroots supporters ready to help.
He’ll face stiff competition, though. Suella Braverman, the Home Secretary, and Kemi Badenoch, newly promoted as Business and Trade Secretary, are both already candidates and squaring off as they pitch to cultural Conservatives worried about things like small boats and trans rights. “They both want to be IDS in a dress”, says an unkind colleague, referring to Iain Duncan Smith’s doomed leadership of the Conservative opposition in the early 2000s.
Foreign Secretary James Cleverly is tipped by some Tories as a contender, while Gillian Keegan, the education secretary who left school at 16 then triumphed in business, is spoken of as a potential candidate for the One Nation group of Tory moderates. Many other, newer names will follow, and the poison will flow. The business of government; the memory of last year’s turmoils; and Sunak’s best efforts to promote unity — all are keeping Conservative tensions in check. But the Tories are tired and fractious, so when their next leadership battle moves into the light, the party’s private pains will be plain for all to see.
