The race is underway to replace Liz Truss as Tory party leader and Prime Minister.
Nominations opened on Thursday evening (October 20) and hopeful MPs have until 2pm on Monday (October 24) to put themselves forward. However, candidates will need to have received 'at least 100' nominations from colleagues to run for the leadership, meaning there will be a maximum of three contenders.
Tory MPs have been declaring their support for either Rishi Sunak, Penny Mourdant or former PM Boris Johnson to run the country throughout the day. However Ms Mourdant is the only MP who has officially declared her intention to stand for election so far.
A Tory MP backing Ms Mordaunt’s leadership bid said he is “incredibly confident” she will get the 100 MP nominations needed to reach the members’ voting stage. Robbie Moore (Keighley & Ilkley) told the PA news agency: “What we need now is a candidate more than ever that is able to unite the Conservative Parliamentary Party, able to unite our membership, but most importantly that is able to deliver on the 2019 manifesto commitments that we made, and that is exactly why I think Penny is the right person to take not just the Conservative Party forward but our nation forward.”
Meanwhile former Health Secretary Sajid Javid has backed Mr Sunak, stating in a Tweet: "I'm backing @RishiSunak - he has the leadership our country needs, and the values our party needs." MP for Bolton North East, Mark Logan, declared his support for Mr Sunak from his hospital bed.
Minister for the Cabinet Office Alok Sharma is among the latest to declare his support for Mr Johnson, tweeting: "I am backing @BorisJohnson - he won a mandate from the electorate in 2019. We need to get back to delivering on the @conservatives manifesto we were elected on."
Check out our live tracker below, which shows how many endorsements each prospective leader has received so far.
Here are the latest odds on who will succeed Liz Truss as Tory party leader, according to Betfair.com:
- Rishi Sunak: 14/19 (was 4/6 on Friday morning)
- Boris Johnson: 9/5 (was 3/1 on Friday morning)
- Penny Mordaunt: 8/1 (was 9/1 before confirming she will run in contest)
Former Prime Minister Mr Johnson is also odds-on at 8/15 to receive 100-plus nominations from party MPs to run in the leadership contest.
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