Furious war of words between rival camps for Truss and Sunak
ALLIES of Tory leadership favourite Rishi Sunak boasted he would ‘wipe the floor’ with rival Liz Truss yesterday, branding her backers ‘headbangers’.
But furious supporters of the Foreign Secretary fired back, highlighting the Chancellor’s ‘so clever’ decision to miss last week’s Commons apology by Boris Johnson by going on a much-derided trip to Devon instead.
The briefing war erupted as MPs close to the Prime Minister took aim at both potential contenders, claiming Mr Sunak resisted ‘huge pressure’ to back Mr Johnson but also casting doubt on Ms Truss’s leadership credentials.
Tory insiders claim both have leadership operations ‘in all but name’ ready to go if Mr Johnson is forced out, with one MP noting how the Chancellor had only last week hastily arranged three meetings with Tory backbenchers to discuss ‘rising energy bills’.
Last night, one of Mr Sunak’s allies poured derision on Ms Truss’s prospects. He branded many of her backers ‘headbangers’ and added: ‘When you’ve got Therese Coffey and Andrea Leadsom as your main backers, you’ve got a problem.’
He added: ‘When Rishi gets out there and the media get hold of Rishi vs Liz Truss, he is going to wipe the floor with her. He is so much better.’
The Sunak ally insisted the Chancellor, 41, was not running a leadership campaign, saying that to do anything ‘organised’ now with Mr Johnson still in No 10 would be ‘curtains’.
But he implied that the Foreign Secretary’s camp was doing just that, saying: ‘That’s Truss’s problem – she’s too eager.’
The attack sparked a furious response last night, with a source close to Work and Pensions Secretary Ms Coffey insisting: ‘This is nonsense – there is no campaign. Liz and Therese are 100 per cent behind the PM.’ Ms Leadsom declined to comment.
Only last month, the Foreign Secretary, 46, leapfrogged the Chancellor as party members’ choice to be PM in a survey on the ConHome website – fuelling predictions that if she got through to the last round of a leadership contest, she would win. Her allies angrily dismissed the gossip, with a source saying: ‘This is total and utter fiction – there is no leadership campaign.’ Insisting that the Foreign Secretary was ‘incredibly busy with EU talks and Russia/Ukraine’, the source added: ‘Liz is 100 per cent behind the PM.’
Allies of Ms Truss went on the attack to mock Mr Sunak’s decision to honour a pre-arranged trip to Ilfracombe, Devon, last Wednes
‘Rishi is going to wipe the floor with her’
day – meaning that, unlike Ms Truss, he was not sitting next to the PM in the Commons when Mr Johnson apologised over the No10 party.
Critics say the Chancellor compounded the error by waiting till 8.20pm that day to comment, with a tweet that said ‘the PM was to right apologise’, but stopped short of fulsome backing for Mr Johnson. One Truss supporter said the lack of support for Mr Johnson had backfired, adding: ‘Rishi thought he was being so clever.’
Last night, allies of the PM spoke of how Mr Sunak had not responded to ‘huge pressure’ on Ministers to show their support for Mr Johnson last Wednesday. One said: ‘He was the one who was the most resistant. He wasn’t picking up his calls.’ But last night, a source close to the Chancellor insisted that Mr Sunak’s team was asked just ‘once’ by No10 on Wednesday if he would be commenting.
Saying that Mr Sunak did not have a leadership campaign, the source said that last week’s meetings with about 100 Tory MPs at Westminster ‘was to canvass opinion on how to tackle rising energy bills and how best to help families with that’.
Lord (William) Hague, who became party leader at just 36 in 1997, has reportedly weighed into the controversy, with claims he has privately advised Mr Sunak ‘not to make the same mistake I made’ and become party leader ‘too early’.