Thread by @jonworth

Let's have a little look into the 🔮 and think about who might succeed Boris Johnson as the next leader of the Tory Party and future Prime Minister...

A speculative 🧵

First of all, what information have we even got?

Oddschecker has the betting odds for next Tory leader 👇
oddschecker.com/politics/briti…

Sunak 9/4
Gove 8/1
Truss 12/1
Hunt 16/1
Javid 20/1
Patel 27/1

There is also Conservative Home's Cabinet League Table - November edition 👇
conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2…

This comes pre-Christmas Party revelations and pre Plan B / Omicron, and as Hunt is not in cabinet he's not on it

Remember that it's Tory members that will vote here, not the members of the general public... and based on that Conservative Home poll the members are not exactly in a pragmatic mood

There is also what strikes me as a sort of intellectual faccid-ness of the Tory Party just now - most importantly underlined by so many backbenchers' grumblings about Plan B and COVID, but based on the highly ideological and non-practical foundations of Brexit

The UK population is closer to Labour's position on COVID restrictions than it is to the government's, and there's a sizeable chunk of the Tory benches who are miles away from where the general population is

And importantly *they don't seem to care*

It's as if ideological purity, and governing in the land of make believe, is going to be fine to see them over the line to win again

And - although both members and MPs now seem to not see it - Johnson is *central* to that make believe, make it up politics

Why bother with good policies, or a solid economic plan, when you can sell people the make believe that Britain will do just fine in future?

Why not just lie your way through that there's an oven ready deal when there isn't actually?

And - perhaps most important of all - that make believe proposition was what held together the Tories' electoral coalition in 2019 - the Red Wall constituencies and the traditional shires

In other words Johnson was - in 2019 - the Heineken Tory. Reaching parts of the electorate other Tories cannot reach

But what about his successor then?

The Conservative Home poll - putting Truss and Lord Frost out front seems to imply that living in the land of make believe is precisely what the Tory members still want

What's not to like about a trade deal with Tuvalu! 🎉🎁

Frost I reckon would like the top job himself, but as he's not a MP (and there's no safe seat available for him) he's going to have to round behind some other contender

Round behind Truss and she's the person to beat

Thing is that Truss is not Johnson. She's not a one-off, capable of appearing on Have I Got News for You politician. She's your general run of the mill opportunistic Tory. And actually she's not such an inveterate liar as Johnson

She's also comparatively untested in the media

On the other side is Sunak

Unlike Truss over-selling every little thing, he's largely chosen to keep his head down in recent months

But in there remains the suspicion he's a small state, austere Tory really

I can't see a route to the top job for Gove (too weird) or Javid or Hunt (for Tory members simply too dull and too sensible). And Patel is too disliked it seems

It looks to me like Truss has the best cards from here

But my conclusion is this: WHOEVER it is will be easier to oppose than Johnson, and will have a less broad appeal than Johnson did in 2019. And that person will lead a Tory Party that lacks any cohesiveness and is borderline self indulgent

Yet with confidence in Johnson shot within the party, and him likely to be removed sooner or later, he's going to be bequeathing a rather complicated situation to his successor!

/ends

P.S. And thanks all of you going "but MPs will do this! Or that!" - yes, I did consider that MPs whittle the field down to two candidates. And that extreme MPs are important here. Truss will pitch to them the way Cameron did.