Tory MPs chose Rishi Sunak - but don’t assume they’ll vote for his policies

‘Rishi Sunak has been painted as the liberal, establishment candidate, but he is much more conventionally rightwing than either Johnson or Truss.’ Photograph: Guy Bell/REX/Shutterstock

So there we have it. In the end, Penny Mordaunt couldn’t quite scrape together enough nominees to make it over the threshold and trigger a full leadership election. Perhaps if Boris Johnson had pulled out a day or two earlier, she might have been able to build the requisite momentum. But it wasn’t to be.

Now Rishi Sunak will be the UK’s latest prime minister. His mission, which I suppose he now has no option but to accept, is somehow to keep the Conservatives united enough to govern and thus avoid what would be a catastrophic general election.