Even by the murky standards of Tory leadership contests, yesterday’s result was astonishing. Yet again, the Tory parliamentary party lived up to its reputation as the most duplicitous electorate in Britain.
The well-liked James Cleverly, the most experienced candidate as a former foreign secretary, home secretary and Tory chairman, was runaway favourite to make it into the last two.
Prior to his assured speech at last week’s Tory conference in Birmingham, he was joint third alongside Tom Tugendhat in the race. By Tuesday’s ballot, that speech had helped catapult him into a commanding lead.
The question marks over his judgement in opening negotiations with the Mauritian government as foreign secretary on the handover of the Chagos Islands, had seemingly not dented his leadership chances.
Nor the fact that, as the longest serving MP among the contenders, he was seen as a continuity candidate – when many thought the Conservatives needed change.
James Cleverly crashed out of the race for the Conservative leadership in dramatic fashion yesterday
Either Kemi Badenoch or Robert Jenrick are now set to become Tory party leader
No, he was quietly confident, according to his closest friends. And he is now ‘shocked’ by yesterday’s turn of events. Was he over-confident? While his rivals Robert Jenrick and Kemi Badenoch were on the phone to Tory MPs shoring up their support, Cleverly was spotted on the Commons terrace on Tuesday night and then later at the launch of Boris Johnson’s memoir, Unleashed.
Given his experience, Cleverly should have seen the skullduggery afoot. There always is.
I suspected something was up when, shortly before Tuesday’s vote, Tugendhat, the former army officer who was security minister in the last government, told his friends: ‘If every MP who’s pledged their support to me is telling the truth, I’m through to the next round.’
His last-place finish in Tuesday’s ballot – 11 votes behind Jenrick in second – suggests they were not telling him the truth.
And why was Jenrick, even after dropping two votes from the previous round in that ballot, surprisingly upbeat? The word at Westminster is that Team Jenrick encouraged its supporters to vote for Cleverly to push Tugendhat out of the race. Tugendhat, a distinguished former soldier had performed better than expected after suggesting the UK should leave the European Court of Human Rights – parking his tanks on Jenrick’s lawn.
Others argue that, yesterday, Cleverly had foolishly lent votes to Jenrick to try to keep Badenoch out of the final two.
Either way, Jenrick’s survival is a remarkable turnaround after the former immigration minister gave a lacklustre conference speech and, in a blundering campaign video, effectively accused British special forces of executing captives in Afghanistan. No one will know for certain what happened because it’s a secret ballot. But the final stages of any Tory leadership contest are always the same.
Promises of big shadow ministry jobs, overseas trips and high-profile select committee placements are all used to flatter and woo supporters of rival candidates.
Conservative Party leadership candidate Mr Jenrick seen on stage after delivering his speech during the conference
Conservative Party leadership candidate Ms Badenoch delivers a speech during the conference at the International Convention Centre in Birmingham
Only, it seems that Cleverly didn’t feel the need to flatter as much as Jenrick and Badenoch.
The result means that two candidates firmly on the Right will fight it out for the 160,000 members’ vote. There is no one from the centre of the party on the ballot paper. So it becomes more of a personality parade than an intellectual battle of ideas, which the party badly needs.
How will Jenrick or Badenoch win back seats from the Lib Dems who were so effective in dismantling the so-called ‘Blue Wall’ at the last election?
With a record 72 MPs, the Lib Dems ousted four cabinet ministers and captured constituencies once held by former prime ministers David Cameron, Theresa May, and Boris Johnson. Jenrick versus Badenoch is exactly the result the sanctimonious Lib Dem leader Ed Davey was hoping for.
Only last week, friends of the centrist Andy Street, narrowly defeated by Labour as the Tory mayor of the West Midlands, warned that if it’s Badenoch and Jenrick in the run-off, he may quit the Tories – the party he joined as a teenager.
‘Andy thinks the last thing we need are two candidates hewn from the same block fighting it out,’ said a friend of Street.
One Tory MP even backed Badenoch ‘because she’s gaffe-prone and will blow up and then we can get rid of her and start all over again’.
Another lamented that just as Labour voters might be feeling a pinch of buyer’s remorse, they are reminded of the Tory predeliction for suicidal in-fighting.
And the truth of Cleverly’s demise? The last person I’d ask is a Tory MP – I’m not sure I would believe their answer.