Tory MPs face a sullen choice between secondbest leaders
Why are the Conservatives even having a contest to pick their next leader? Boris Johnson just won an eradefining referendum with 17.4 million votes and is, by many measures, Britain’s most popular politician.
Yet instead of crowning him with laurels, his colleagues in Parliament are giving serious thought to someone else as leader. Not just anyone either, but a woman short on charm who was on the opposite side of the referendum from most party members.
That Mr Johnson is even having to fight for the leadership is sign of how divisive the referendum was – and how divisive a figure it threatens to make even someone as affable as him. “A lot of Remainers, in the country and in the party, will never forgive Boris,” says one minister.
Others see an offputting inconstancy in the internationalist Mr Johnson’s conversion to Brexit. “There’s a trust problem. He’s one mistake away from oblivion,” says a former minister who is supporting Mr Johnson.
History teaches that front-runners lose Tory races, so Team Boris, not unreasonably, casts him as falling behind Theresa May. The Home Secretary is the choice of a party establishment that scorns Mr Johnson as an outsider and an opportunist. She has David Cameron’s vote.
Talking to Tory MPs on all sides, what’s striking is their lack of excitement. Few Johnson backers are starryeyed believers; most are realistic about his potential weaknesses. Not even Mrs May’s loyal allies suggest she ignites the fires of passion. “She’s the sensible choice, but who gets excited about sensible?” asks one. “What I’d really like is a hybrid with the good bits of Boris and Theresa, but we’ll end up with the bad bits of one of them,” says an undecided minister glumly.
The candidate who comes closest to an uplifting vision is Stephen Crabb, the Work and Pensions Secretary, who describes “a society that provides a fairer set of opportunities for all”.
His life story (council house, abusive father, inspirational single mother) stands in deliberate contrast to that of Mr Johnson. “On the rainy rugby fields of west Wales I learnt that it’s not a question of waiting for the ball to pop out from the scrum. If you want it, you do what’s required,” Mr Crabb said yesterday. The heartfelt cheers that he drew from his supporters spoke of Tory resentment at what some see as languid entitlement in Mr Johnson, whose absence from the Commons this week has not impressed his colleagues.
At another time, Mr Crabb would be the man to beat, the candidate of the future. But here and now, the party is focused utterly on the present crisis. Mr Crabb’s lack of top-flight experience means his best hope of making the run-off is as the beneficiary of a conspiracy between Mrs May’s team (many MPs believe it covertly includes Liam Fox) and Cameron loyalists determined to keep Boris off the ballot paper.
If such schemes fail, Tories will choose between Mr Johnson and Mrs May, with the odds favouring the former. And then what?
“When Cameron became leader, there was real excitement, real optimism, even among those of us who didn’t vote for him,” says one senior MP. “That won’t happen this time.”
Tory MPs are making a sullen choice between second-best options. The winner, who will face the most daunting job of national leadership since 1940, will start the task unloved in their own party.