London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Oct 07, 2025

Tory discontent with Boris Johnson spreads as MPs fear losing seats

Tory discontent with Boris Johnson spreads as MPs fear losing seats

Minister says PM in ‘yellow card territory’ after Sue Gray’s Partygate report as more MPs hand in letters of no confidence

Anger among Tory backbenchers is spreading amid fallout from the Sue Gray report, with one minister warning Boris Johnson is in “yellow card territory”.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions, the Treasury minister John Glen said he had had a “very frank and very honest” meeting with Johnson to express his and his constituents’ misgivings.

“I think we are in yellow card territory but as a member of the government I went to see him and let him know how I felt and my constituents felt, but he asked me to get on with the job of driving reforms in financial services,” he said on Friday night.

The former cabinet minister David Davis said unease was spreading across Conservative ranks as MPs feared the Downing Street lockdown parties scandal could cost them their seats.

“Nobody in the world could have made it plainer, I don’t think, that I want the prime minister to go – I haven’t changed my mind about that,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

Asked whether discontent was spreading in the Tory party, Davis said: “There is no doubt about that, for two reasons.

“Number one, frankly they see their own seats disappearing in many cases, they see themselves losing the next election on the back of this.

“Also, it has a bad effect on the country … it is a distraction on everything you do and it doesn’t help the reputation of the country.”

The former Brexit secretary said party leadership trouble traditionally took a long time to be sorted out, pointing to the length of time John Major and Theresa May stayed in No 10 despite experiencing backbench revolt.

He added: “I fear we’ll not resolve this until the latter part of the year.”

The warning by Davis of increasing mutiny came after polling company YouGov produced new modelling suggesting the Conservatives would lose all but three of 88 “battleground” constituencies if a general election were held on Saturday, putting the government’s Commons majority in jeopardy.

Under the predicted outcome, Johnson’s Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat would “likely fall” into Labour hands and “red wall” seats such as Blyth Valley and Stoke-on-Trent North would revert back to Labour, according to YouGov.

In order for a vote of no confidence to be triggered, the chair of the 1922 Committee, Graham Brady, must receive letters from at least 54 Conservative MPs – 15% of the parliamentary party.

Former health minister Steve Brine has added his name to the list of Tory MPs to have handed in letters of no confidence, it has emerged.

Brine said the Gray report had not altered his view that it was “inevitable the prime minister would face a vote of confidence. All I can do as a backbencher is seek to trigger that process and (some time ago actually) I have done that”, he said in a statement published on his website on Wednesday but only picked up by the media on Saturday.

“I have said throughout this sorry saga I cannot and will not defend the indefensible. Rule-makers cannot be law-breakers.”

Newton Abbot MP Anne Marie Morris is also among the letter writers, having confirmed that she has had the Tory whip restored after it was removed in January for her decision to support an opposition move to cut VAT on energy bills.

The veteran Conservative Sir Bob Neill, a qualified barrister and chair of the Commons justice committee, confirmed he had submitted a letter of no confidence on Friday.

And also on Friday, the Conservative MP for Rutland and Melton Alicia Kearns , a previous critic of Johnson, released a statement saying she still had no confidence in him.

Her constituency, which includes Melton Mowbray, sparked talk of a “pork pie putsch” when she and other Tory MPs discussed trying to oust the PM in January.

In a stinging Facebook post, Kearns said calls to move on “treat with contempt and disregard” the sacrifices other people made. She wrote: “I can only conclude that the prime minister’s account of events to parliament was misleading.”


Johnson announced changes to the ministerial code on Friday in a move his rivals said watered down punishments for ministers.

An update said ministers would not automatically lose their jobs if theybreached the standards code, and can instead apologise or possibly have their salary suspended instead.

Chris Bryant, the chair of the Commons standards committee, said the “loosening” of the ministerial code by Johnson was “bizarre” and showed why there should be an independent system in place for judging the conduct of ministers.

The Labour MP told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme he disagreed with recommendations made by the independent committee on standards in public life, which allow ministers to remain in their jobs for what could be deemed minor breaches of the code.

“Maybe this is what you would expect from people who have mostly been civil servants in the past – that’s how they end up on the committee on standards in public life – that they would support a strong government that is, broadly speaking, able to do what it likes,” he said.

He called for a “proper system whereby an independent figure, entirely without the prime minister’s involvement, decides whether or not to launch an investigation into a minister, and decides whether it is a very serious case or a less serious case, and then suggests the sanction”.

Bryant added: “That’s not what the prime minister has got, it still all lies in the prime minister’s hands and we know, don’t we, that the prime minister always finds himself innocent in the court of his own opinion.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
×