Johnson backer threatens to cut Tory funds

1922 Committee has too much power and leadership rules must change, says Lord Cruddas

ONE of the Conservatives’ biggest donors has threatened to stop funding them unless party rules are changed to prevent another prime minister being ousted in the same way as Boris Johnson.

Lord Cruddas, who has given the Tories more than £3million, said the way Mr Johnson, a democratically elected leader, had been “constructively dismissed” was “corrupt” and “wrong”.

Asked in an interview with the Tortoise news website under what circumstances he would stop donating, the City billionaire and former Tory treasurer said: “If nothing changes, if Boris goes and this [party] constitution remains the same, I’m not interested.

“It’s not a personal thing. It’s just the wrong way to run a business. It’s the wrong way to run a political party and it is going to get worse. I can’t give to the party… what they’ve done to Boris is just a catalyst for me to say ‘enough’.”

Lord Cruddas has led a campaign with the Conservative post website to secure 10,000 signatures from Tory party members to force a change to its constitution and allow a ballot on whether to accept Mr Johnson’s resignation. It has garnered backing from 8,700.

With a week to go before a new leader is declared, Lord Cruddas said that, given a choice between keeping Mr Johnson as Prime Minister under the same party constitution or rewriting the rules, he would take the latter. Though he added a new constitution and Mr Johnson as leader would be “nirvana”.

“I honestly believe that the Conservative Party, if it can change the constitution and listen to its members, would be the most successful political party for the next generation,” he said.

He said the current process – where 54 MPS can trigger a vote of confidence which requires a simple majority to remove a sitting prime minister – allowed a group of MPS to dictate what they thought best for the country.

This was despite Mr Johnson having got 43 per cent of the popular vote and 80-seat majority with a manifesto and mandate from the electorate to deliver, said Lord Cruddas.

“He has effectively been constructively dismissed by a group of MPS for whatever reason but the problem with that is that it’s going against the electorate and it cannot be right for a political party to be having the tail wagging the dog,” he said.

He claimed too much power was vested in the 1922 Committee of backbench MPS, which oversaw a process conducted behind closed doors with secret balloting and swirling with rumours about “vote lending, vote rigging”. He said: “The whole thing stinks… you can’t have a democratically-elected leader of our party constructively dismissed by a group of people with vested interests, self-serving and they think they know what’s best for us.”

Lord Cruddas said it was evidence of the Conservative Party “imploding” and “self-destructing”. He said: “What you are witnessing today is the self-destruction of the Conservative Party and it has to change.

“You cannot have a cabal of MPS controlling everything, which is what we are having today. The party belongs to the members and I want the members to have a greater say. I want to extricate the 1922 Committee from the Conservative Party.”

Lord Cruddas worked as a foreign currency trader after leaving school at 15, working his way up to head foreign exchange dealer at Petra Bank before starting his own business CMC markets with £10,000 in the bank. CMC Markets is currently valued at nearly £650million.

‘If nothing changes, if Boris goes and this [party] constitution remains the same, I’m not interested’