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ITV News political editor Robert Peston reports on which of the remaining candidates is most likely to reach the last two in the leadership race.
To use a sports cliché, Penny Mordaunt has given life to the Conservative leadership election.
The little-known former Secretary of Defense finished second in today’s first round, with 67 votes, 17 more than the third, Liz Truss, and 21 behind leader Sunak’s 88.
And given that MPs ’contest is to find the first two, Mordaunt will believe the momentum is with her, while Foreign Secretary Truss should be anxious.
The question is whether the way Jacob Rees-Mogg and Nadine Dorries positioned Truss yesterday as a Boris-Revenge-on-Sunak candidate has harmed or helped Truss.
Either way, he has considerable ground to recover. Tonight there are three big questions.
First, where will the votes of the two nominated candidates, Jeremy Hunt and Nadhim Zahawi, go tomorrow?
My intuition is that more than 18 of Hunt would go to Mordaunt, given his position in One Nation, than to Truss. And as for Zahawi’s sponsors, and Zahawi himself, it’s a calculation I still don’t feel qualified to make.
Second, we now enter the territory of ruthless and cynical gambling.
For those Boris Johnson fans who want Sunak defeated at any cost, one question is whether they transfer their loyalty from Truss to Mordaunt, especially because recent polls (e.g. from YouGov) show that Sunak can fight to beat Bite on the second lap. when Tory party members make the important decision about which of the two main candidates will be the party leader and the prime minister.
You will notice that I am making a bold assumption, which may not be achieved, that it is very likely that Sunak will reach the long second round contest during the summer as he only needs 32 more votes to reach the 120 magic, which guarantees a place . in the last two.
So the question is whether you have enough registered sponsors or are they likely to come so you can lend some of your votes to any candidate who feels more confident of winning the second round.
Remember that when Boris Johnson became the leader in 2019 he was so advanced that he lent some votes to Jeremy Hunt, because he felt more confident of beating Hunt in the second round than of beating third-placed Michael Gove.
So Sunak’s question is whether he would rather face Truss or Mordaunt.
What is your bet?
Rishi Sunak in launching his campaign to be leader and prime minister of the Conservative Party. Credit: PA
Finally, the other candidate who defied initial expectations is Kemi Badenoch, whose resignation from the government last week – like Sunak’s – helped force Johnson’s resignation.
She got 40 votes, which is enough to be a major creator of kings, if not reach the voting stage of the members.
It is believed that she, and her most prominent supporter, Michael Gove, will end up supporting Sunak.
If this is correct, and if she and Gove have any influence over the other 38 of her sponsors, then Sunak can trust her place to the hustings during these long summer weeks when members decide who will lead the UK government.
UPDATE 19.11 Maybe I misjudged myself. Speaking to Conservative MPs, it looks like a good number of Hunt’s 18 followers will be transferred directly to Sunak.
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