London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Thursday, Sep 18, 2025

Senior Tories privately dismiss petition to reinstate Boris Johnson

Senior Tories privately dismiss petition to reinstate Boris Johnson

Exclusive: organisers claim petition has nearly 14,000 signatures but CCHQ sampling found fewer than half were party members
Senior Conservatives have privately voiced scepticism about a poll demanding party members be given a vote on the removal of Boris Johnson, after the party’s headquarters found fewer than half of a sample of signatories were party members.

The authors of the petition have said addresses and membership numbers provided by the signatories are undergoing stringent checks and that Conservative campaign headquarters (CCHQ) has not yet received the vast majority of the signatories.

The website Conservative Post, which organised the petition, said it was being overseen by a team of experienced professionals.

The petition is being championed by the Tory donor Peter Cruddas and the former MEP David Campbell Bannerman, who said on Tuesday the campaign had nearly 14,000 signatures.

However, the Guardian understands CCHQ has sampled a few hundred names asking for Johnson’s reinstatement and the majority were not party members. Organisers say CCHQ is yet to receive the bulk of the names and that its sampling would not be representative.

The petition on the Conservative Post website claims it has “racked up more than 10,000 member signatures in just a week” and that signatories are “required to enter proof of membership in order to sign the petition, which is then immediately sent to the Conservative party chairmen Ben Elliot and Rt Hon Andrew Stephenson MP.”

That statement is expected to be revised and the petition will be forwarded in full at a later stage in the leadership contest.

The poll has led supporters of Johnson to claim that one in 10 Conservative members support his reinstatement as prime minister or for his name to be put on the ballot paper – and suggestions of a potential members’ revolt against the two candidates, Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss.

But internally, senior figures said so far the party had received about 300 messages with the text from the petition. Names were checked and fewer than half had come from people with active Conservative party memberships.

The party is likely to receive significantly more names when the final petition is submitted, but while the petition has space to input a Conservative membership number and address, a false or random number can be put in its place.

The petition’s authors say they have systems in place to catch any false information and have been liaising with CCHQ to verify the numbers are correct. Membership number information is held only by CCHQ.

Online, a number of social media accounts have filled in the petition with false information – including under the names of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and the foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov. The petition’s organisers said all fake names had been caught and IP addresses for each signatory had been checked.

Lord Cruddas has said the petition represents the will of the membership – in echoes of the way the former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn won the members’ vote a second time after attempts by MPs to depose him. Many of those signing have written long comments expressing distress at Johnson’s defenestration.

Cruddas has claimed Johnson “does not want to resign” and “wished that he could carry on” as prime minister, comments he has said were made to him by the prime minister over lunch at Chequers on Friday.

“The membership are very upset about what has happened to our elected leader and we demand our say,” he said, announcing the petition.

“This is nonsense and all part of the coup to get rid of Boris. We’ve had hackers and now this. They’re all trying to undermine democracy and now they’re trying to cast doubt on our petition. Thank you to all the members who have signed and continued to sign. The truth will come out and all will be verified.”

A No 10 spokesperson said: “The prime minister has resigned as party leader and set out his intention to stand down as PM when the new leader is in place.”

Campbell-Bannerman said there were more 12,000 people who had filled in forms that would be sent by email to CCHQ. “As with all polls there are some done out of malice or for humour, but that seems a very small proportion,” he said.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Massive Strikes in France Pressure Macron and New PM on Austerity Proposals
Trump Seeks Supreme Court Permission to Remove Fed Governor Lisa Cook
Hillary Clinton’s Reckless Rhetoric Fuels Division After Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
NASDAQ Rises to Record as Intel Soars More Than 20%, Nvidia Gains 3%
Nvidia’s $5 Billion Bet on Intel Reshapes AI Hardware Landscape
Trump and Starmer Clash Over UK Recognition of Palestinian State Amid State Visit
Trump’s Quip on Biden and Google Lawsuit Revives Debate Over Antitrust Legacy
Macron and his wife to provide 'scientific photographic evidence' that she is a real woman
US Tech Giants Pledge Billions to UK AI Infrastructure Following Starmer's Call
Saudi Arabia cracks down on music ‘lounges’ after conservative backlash
DeepMind and OpenAI Achieve Gold at ‘Coding Olympics’ in AI Milestone
SEC Allows Public Companies to Block Investors from Class-Action Lawsuits
Saudi Arabia Signs ‘Strategic Mutual Defence’ Pact with Pakistan, Marking First Arab State to Gain Indirect Access to Nuclear Strike Capabilities in the Region
Federal Reserve Cuts Rates by Quarter Point and Signals More to Come
Effective and Impressive Generation Z Protest: Images from the Riots in Nepal
European manufacturers against ban on polluting cars: "The industry may collapse"
Sam Altman sells the 'Wedding Estate' in Hawaii for 49 million dollars
Trump: Cancel quarterly company reports and settle for reporting once every six months
Turkish car manufacturer Togg Enters German Market with 5-Star Electric Sedan and SUV to Challenge European EV Brands
US Launches New Pilot Program to Accelerate eVTOL Air Taxi Deployment
Christian Brueckner Released from German Prison after Serving Unrelated Sentence
World’s Longest Direct Flight China Eastern to Launch 29-Hour Shanghai–Buenos Aires Direct Flight via Auckland in December
New OpenAI Study Finds Majority of ChatGPT Use Is Personal, Not Professional
Hong Kong Industry Group Calls for HK$20 Billion Support Fund to Ease Property Market Stress
Joe Biden’s Post-Presidency Speaking Fees Face Weak Demand amid Corporate Reluctance
Charlie Kirk's murder will break the left's hateful cancel tactics
Kash Patel erupts at ‘buffoon’ Sen. Adam Schiff over Russiagate: ‘You are the biggest fraud’
Homeland Security says Emmy speech ‘fanning the flames of hatred’ after Einbinder’s ‘F— ICE’ remark
Charlie Kirk’s Alleged Assassin Tyler Robinson Faces Death Penalty as Charges Formally Announced
Actor, director, environmentalist Robert Redford dies at 89
The conservative right spreads westward: a huge achievement for 'Alternative for Germany' in local elections
JD Vance Says There Is “No Unity” with Those Who Celebrate Charlie Kirk’s Killing, and he is right!
Trump sues the 'New York Times' for an astronomical sum of 15 billion dollars
Florida Hospital Welcomes Its Largest-Ever Baby: Annan, Nearly Fourteen Pounds at Birth
U.S. and Britain Poised to Finalize Over $10 Billion in High-Tech, Nuclear and Defense Deals During Trump State Visit
China Finds Nvidia Violated Antitrust Laws in Mellanox Deal, Deepens Trade Tensions with US
US Air Force Begins Modifications on Qatar-Donated Jet Amid Plans to Use It as Air Force One
Pope Leo Warns of Societal Crisis Over Mega-CEO Pay, Citing Tesla’s Proposed Trillion-Dollar Package
Poland Green-Lights NATO Deployment in Response to Major Russian Drone Incursion
Elon Musk Retakes Lead as World’s Richest After Brief Ellison Surge
U.S. and China Agree on Framework to Shift TikTok to American Ownership
London Daily Podcast: London Massive Pro Democracy Rally, Musk Support, UK Economic Data and Premier League Results Mark Eventful Weekend
This Week in AI: Meta’s Superintelligence Push, xAI’s Ten Billion-Dollar Raise, Genesis AI’s Robotics Ambitions, Microsoft Restructuring, Amazon’s Million-Robot Milestone, and Google’s AlphaGenome Update
Le Pen Tightens the Pressure on Macron as France Edges Toward Political Breakdown
Musk calls for new UK government at huge pro-democracy rally in London, but Britons have been brainwashed to obey instead of fighting for their human rights
Elon Musk responds to post calling for the murder of Erika Kirk, widow of Charlie Kirk: 'Either we fight back or they will kill us'
Czech Republic signs €1.34 billion contract for Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks with delivery from 2028
USA: Office Depot Employees Refused to Print Poster in Memory of Charlie Kirk – and Were Fired
Proposed U.S. Bill Would Allow Civil Suits Against Judges Who Release Repeat Violent Offenders
Penske Media Sues Google Over “AI Overviews,” Claiming It Uses Journalism Without Consent and Destroys Traffic
×