By Ben Johnson-
Boris Johnson will face a confidence vote in his leadership of the Conservative Party after enough MPs submitted letters calling for a contest.
It will take place between 6pm and 8pm this evening in the House of Commons and an announcement is expected about an hour after the vote closes.
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After months of speculation, it has been confirmed that at least 54 MPs – 15% of Tory MPs – have written to the chair of the 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, Sir Graham Brady, calling for a vote. Often referred to as “the men in grey suits”, the 1922 Committee is led by an 18-member executive committee with a chair elected by committee members
Brady said he notified the PM on Sunday that the threshold had been reached and they agreed on timings for the vote together.
The Conservative Party rules state that at least 15% of Tory MPs must write a no confidence letter to make a leadership challenge possible.
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This figure currently equates to 54 Conservative MPs needing to submit a letter to 1922 Committee chairman Sir Graham Brady.
The letters came after a long period of pressure on the prime minister over the partygate revelations of lockdown-breaking events in Downing Street and Whitehall, for which Mr Johnson was fined once.
Following the publication of senior civil servant Sue Gray’s damning full report into partygate, there has been a surge of Conservative MPs calling for the PM to go.
Her findings pushed enough MPs to submit letters and the PM now faces a vote in his leadership a little under two and a half years after he won the biggest Tory majority since the 1980s.
Moments after Sir Graham announced a vote of no confidence would happen, MPs loyal to Mr Johnson have been voicing their support for him.
Foreign Office minister James Cleverly said he is “not going to go flaky on him now”, while his boss, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said the PM has my “100% backing”.
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