Boris Johnson is going - so what happens now?

8 July 2022, 14:06

Going, going, but not quite yet gone, Boris Johnson can still claim to be Prime Minister in name, but he is on his way out - once the Conservative Party gets its timetable to replace him sorted out.

It's a peculiar kind of gardening leave - still employed and allowed to potter around Downing Street, as long as he doesn't attempt to actually do anything except start packing up.

Can that hugely expensive, flamboyant, Lulu Lytle wallpaper - 10 rolls at £225 a pop - be steamed off and re-rolled for use elsewhere? Is the £500 kitchen table cloth already in a box?

But he's promised not to make his new ad-hoc Cabinet do anything "strange" - an appropriate choice of word from a man whose near-three year stint as PM can only be described as one of the stranger things of the 21st century so far.

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While there are noises off about whether or not he should be allowed to remain as PM until a new Tory leader - both Labour and the Liberal Democrats are contemplating a vote of no confidence in the government as a result, with many Conservative MPs deeply uneasy about the situation - the focus has turned to just who will replace him.

On Monday the 1922 committee - the powerful backbench organisation which finally made it clear to Johnson that his position was no longer tenable after almost half the government ministers resigned - will meet to set out the timetable for action.

It's clear however that they want just two names to go to the party membership by July 21 when Parliament breaks for summer recess.

So far (at time of writing) just three MPs have been clear that they want to run - Attorney General Suella Braverman, chair of the foreign affairs select committee Tom Tugendhat, and former Brexit minister Steve Baker - but there is a whole host of other potentials waiting in the wings; currently taking soundings to see just how much support they might have.

Integrity, honesty and unity are the buzzwords of backbenchers discussing what they are looking for; they are over the showmanship of Johnson and want a steady hand on the tiller - and a return to a more old-fashioned One Nation Toryism.

That may well mean they are no longer willing to overlook personality flaws, or whispered rumours of poor behaviour - so if you're a contender with a skeleton in your cupboard, it could already be rattling loudly enough for a blind eye to focus on it.

Running the rule over two of the obvious contenders - Rishi Sunak and Sajid Javid will hope that their decisions to quit the Cabinet on Wednesday will stand them in good stead.

In their minds they made the principled decision to go and they started the ball rolling on the resignations which followed. However Sunak has faced scandal himself this year through his wife's non-dom status (will she want the spotlight that comes with being the spouse of a PM?), and he, like Johnson, was fined for attending a party during lockdown.

But it is believed he is the man whom media mogul Rupert Murdoch is backing - and that could carry a lot of influence.

Javid meanwhile had been wooed back to government by Boris Johnson, after quitting when Dominic Cummings demanded he sack his advisors, and he gave him full-throated support... up until that resignation letter landed.

What of Nadhim Zahawi the new Chancellor? He was promoted into Sunak's job as Johnson attempted to hold things together, declared on TV that the Prime Minister was honest all of the time - then the next day said it was time Johnson went.

Will that raise questions about his honesty and integrity?

Will the fact that he once mistakenly claimed around £5,000 in expenses for heating his riding school stables - money he repaid - be held against him?

Will being a multi-millionaire (like Sunak) also be put in the demerit column as the country faces a cost of living crisis? Certainly it's believed he's backed by the Tory party election guru Lynton Crosby.

Other possible runners and riders include the current Defence Secretary Ben Wallace and trade minister Penny Mordaunt who both scored highly with party members in a snap opinion poll.

Liz Truss, the Foreign Secretary, has made no secret of her desire for the top job, believing herself to be in the mould of Margaret Thatcher, and appears to have shaken off her Remainer credentials and become an ardent Brexiteer.

Similarly Jeremy Hunt, who stood against Johnson the last time, is being punted as the "unity" candidate, with Transport Secretary Grant Shapps another potential contender - though he has a few skeletons already out the cupboard, from ignoring allegations of bullying while he was party co-chairman, to the strange affair of calling himself Michael Green and having a second job, which he at first denied, then had to admit.

Priti Patel could also run - though if the party is looking to unite the nation as well as itself, her Rwanda policy is deeply unpopular in many parts of the UK.

She was also only still in the Cabinet because Boris Johnson ruled she had not broken the ministerial code over bullying allegations despite an inquiry finding evidence she had not treated civil servants at all well, with some behaviour "amounting to bullying".

And what of Tom Tugendhat who has been a long time critic of the Prime Minister? A former TA officer who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, he ticks many of the same Conservative boxes as Ben Wallace, but without the baggage of having served in a Johnson government. Many will remember him from his emotional speech in the Commons on the "grief and rage" he felt at what he called the "abandonment" of Afghanistan.

It is also being reported that Rehman Chishti, the party's vice-chair is considering a bid, as is Jack Berry, a new red wall MP, who leads the Northern Research Group of Tories.

Whittling them all down to just two candidates to put to the party members usually takes some time - time the 1922 Committee does not want to take.

Each candidate must have at least 8 backers before MPs vote, and those with fewer than 18 votes are eliminated, then in the next round those with fewer than 36 are dumped, and so on until only two are left standing.

Pressure will now be on outliers not to bother even tipping their hats ringwards, never mind throwing them in, to ensure the replacement for Boris Johnson is carried out as bloodlessly and as quickly as possible.

Then, and as it stands right now, only then, will Boris Johnson finally vacate Downing Street.