Johnson ‘believes he will be back at No 10 in a year’

BORIS JOHNSON privately believes he will be back in office next year despite agreeing to resign after MPS rose up against his leadership two weeks ago.

Tim Montgomerie, a former aide to Mr Johnson who has since been critical of him, said he had been told by sources close to the Prime Minister that Mr Johnson is convinced he will be back.

In a well-sourced post on social media, Mr Montgomerie wrote: “Boris is telling aides that he’ll be PM again within a year.”

It comes after Mr Johnson told MPS “mission largely accomplished – for now” in his final appearance to MPS at the Dispatch Box in Prime Minister’s Questions last Wednesday.

Senior Conservatives have argued over a campaign among Tory party members to allow them a vote on whether Mr Johnson should stay in office. By last night, 7,600 had signed a petition calling for such a vote.

Lord Cruddas of Shoreditch, a former party treasurer who organised the petition, said “several MPS” had begun to “make noises” about supporting his campaign. That came as Michael Fabricant, a Johnson loyalist, became the first MP to support the “Bring Back Boris” campaign. He told The Daily Telegraph:

“If I thought Boris were keen – despite the treachery of his ministers – to carry on, I would support Peter Cruddas’s Bring Back Boris campaign in a blink of an eye.”

One Cabinet minister loyal to Mr Johnson said: “It is no wonder that the grassroots members feel their voices have been cancelled out by a minority in the Parliamentary party.

“These are the same people who ... have chosen to silence the membership of the Conservative Party for their own preferment and betterment.”

The worry now will be that if more MPS support the Bring Back Boris campaign it will undermine the leadership contest being run between Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss.

Senior Tories have urged members to move on from Mr Johnson’s premiership. Sir Robert Buckland, the Welsh Secretary and a former lord chancellor, said: “The Prime Minister has stood down voluntarily. He is not playing any part in this leadership contest.”

Steve Baker, a former minister, said: “I implore members backing this campaign to think what would happen if they won and Boris continued as Prime Minister – the Government would immediately collapse.”

No 10 declined to comment either on Mr Montgomerie’s remarks or Lord Cruddas’s campaign.