Candidates for conservative leadership are facing a blunt week in which they will have to struggle quickly to find supporters in what appears likely to be a dramatically accelerated contest to find Boris Johnson’s successor.
After a bitter weekend in which several MPs launched their plans to cut taxes, it is likely that those currently competing to be prime ministers will be reduced to the last two in a week.
Sources said the powerful 1922 Conservative Committee of the back bank could increase the number of followers a contender needs to 25, clearing an increasingly crowded field and adding a frantic pace to a nascent campaign that is already besieged by moody briefings.
This would allow them access to the vote in which MPs vote the field until a final pair. A total of nine MPs have already thrown their hats in the ring to replace Johnson, with a tenth, Liz Truss, expected imminently.
It is likely that the committee’s figures will also drive the majority, if not all, of MPs ’votes to take place next week, with the“ serious contenders ”facing off next week, no later than 21 July, when the Commons enter the retreat for the summer.
But the detailed rules of the leadership contest are yet to be set, with the election of a new committee executive to be held Monday evening. Opponents of Johnson are confident of winning, which would mean they could then start working on the rules.
Given the large number of MPs, sources said the committee could triple the number of followers a potential Conservative leader needs from the required eight in 2019 to between 20 and 30.
This would allow for the installation of a new prime minister in late August, allowing the winner to appoint new ministers with about a week to take the lead in his writing before the Commons reconvene from 5 September. “Allowing a new administration some kind of initiation is good for a healthy government in the country,” one MP said.
The committee has no control over the second half of the election, in which party members select the eventual winner from among the two final candidates, overseen by the Conservative party board. But members of the senior committee are likely to pressure the board to allow just four weeks for the second round.
A total of nine candidates have already formally entered the race, the latest being Penny Mordaunt, the former defense minister, whose launch on Sunday failed slightly when her team had to edit a video of campaign tweeted after celebrity complaints that appeared there without permission.
Another likely favorite, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, is due to enter the contest within hours.
As a sign of the complex and fluid tactical considerations in a very open contest, one of the possible favorites, former Secretary of Health and Foreign Affairs Jeremy Hunt, announced that if he won he would turn Esther McVey into his deputy prime minister.
Describing Tatton’s MP and founder of the blue-collar conservative group as John Prescott in his Tony Blair, Hunt said he hoped it could help him attract voters in the north of England.
Allies of Priti Patel, the interior secretary, say her colleagues have asked her to stand up to the concern of conservative lawmakers on the right of the party that her current flag bearers, Attorney General Suella Braverman, and the ‘ex-minister Kemi Badenoch, they could fight to progress.
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On Sunday night, Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested that the public “will think elections are needed” after a change of leader.
He told Channel 4’s The Andrew Neil Show: “I think we’ve constitutionally evolved in a way that people think elections will be needed. Whether the prime minister will call one is another matter.”
A number of candidates gave interviews to the media on Sunday, largely based on competitive and often attractive plans to cut taxes, but with details of how it would be paid, generally beyond broad lines such as economic growth or government efficiency. .
Sajid Javid, the former health secretary, who resigned last week shortly before Johnson left the post of Conservative leader, told the BBC that the planned tax cuts, including the elimination of the national insurance contributions intended to pay for a reform of social assistance, would cost. about £ 39 billion a year.
In the next few days, Javid said, he would produce “a dashboard that will show exactly how all this is.” [will be] financed in a sustainable way ”.
Hunt and Tom Tugendhat, the Conservative MP who chairs the Commonwealth’s foreign affairs committee, said they intended to pay the tax cuts by growing the economy in the long run, while Grant Shapps, the transportation secretary, said which would make efficiency, for example. using less paper in Whitehall.
Rishi Sunak, who resigned last week as chancellor, has called the idea of unfunded tax cuts “comforting fairy tales” and is said to be the subject of negative conferences circulating among some Conservative MPs.
The other declared candidate is Nadhim Zahawi, who replaced Sunak as chancellor, who on Sunday dismissed circulating claims about his financial affairs as “defamation”. He told Sky News that he had “always” paid his taxes and “declared” them in the UK.
The 1922 Committee holds elections for its 18 officers and executive members on Monday afternoon, but already has a majority of members who were deeply critical of Johnson, who are running again.
That part of an anti-Johnson board will still remain even if the prime minister has promised to resign. They feel encouraged, as many of those loyal to the outgoing prime minister have been given ministerial jobs and will therefore not get a vote in the 1922 Committee elections, as they are only available to members on their backs.