Former education secretary Michael Gove has been eliminated from the Conservative leadership race today.
Gove, backed by education secretary Nicky Morgan, has been knocked out of the leadership contest after persuading just 46 MPs to support his bid.
That leaves home secretary Theresa May, who secured 199 votes, and Andrea Leadsom, who won 84, to battle for the top job.
It is now down to Conservative party members to vote for who they want to become the next leader.
Gove’s bid was supported by Morgan as well as schools minister Nick Gibb and skills minister Nick Boles, who helped run the campaign.
Gibb tweeted that he is “very sorry” Gove will not be the next prime minister, adding: “Having worked for him I know he would have been a great and reforming PM.”
He has now backed May and praised her “judgement, experience and character to unite the party and give leadership to our country”.
Morgan also later tweeted she is “disappointed” with the result, but said May is now the “one clear choice to be the country’s PM”.
May is a known supporter of grammar schools and her leadership campaign is being headed by Nick Timothy, who has taken an unpaid sabbatical from his role as director of New Schools Network.
Leadsom, the south Northamptonshire MP, is a former city minister and banker, who campaigned for the UK to leave the EU.
I think that the next leaders of the main parties should not be ‘Remain’ campaigners
Theresa May smacks of ‘Same old same old’ and I wouldn’t trust her as far as I could throw her
May appears to have both Leave and Remain MPs on her side. Politicians are notoriously untrustworthy, but as the choice is between Leadsom with her dodgy background (see Private Eye) and May, I’d back May (although the thought of another Tory PM doesn’t fill me with joy).
Will Morgan and Gibb remain as school ministers under a new PM? Will Gove remain as Justice Secretary, especially if Teresa May becomes PM. They locked horns during Trojan Horse when May had to lose a long-serving and trusted adviser. Gove had to make a public apology to May. It wasn’t long afterwards that the PM moved Gove from the DfE (something he should have done a lot sooner if David Laws’ account of the DfE being a maverick department ‘out of control’ is accurate).
Gove’s just been on Sky News. He couldn’t resist inserting innuendos into his announcement. He’s just said he’d attracted votes from the ‘brightest and the best’ of the MPs. That’s code for ‘those who voted against me are dim and second rate’.
He positioned himself as being on the side of the average and low paid worker, the disadvantaged and vulnerable. Will he again be holidaying in one of the opulent residences, owned via offshore companies by his friend Lord Rothermere this summer? Or will he show his commitment to the disadvantaged by holidaying in a caravan in Skegness? Or perhaps having no holiday at all?
Will he wander down to the local food bank and tell the recipients it’s their fault for making wrong choices?