After the resignation of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, after almost three years in power and a cascade of dozens of resignations that caused a deep institutional crisis, the search for a new leader has been triggered. There is no clear favorite, but among the most popular names for months are Liz Truss, Rishi Sunak, Ben Wallace, Penny Mordaunt, among others.
In the race to lead the Conservative Party and the country, there is still no clear successor. The Tories they will name a new prime minister in time for the party’s convention in October amid a vast list of candidates.
Here are the profiles of the possible successors:
Mary Elizabeth TrussLiz Truss
Foreign Minister since 2021 and Women and Equality Minister since 2019, she is the favorite of the ruling Conservative Party grassroots to succeed Johnson.
Better known as Liz Truss, the 46-year-old British politician has led polls of party members conducted by the Conservative Home website that place her with a popularity rating of 82 points. However, for some analysts Truss has faded slightly in recent months.
Her supporters present her as “the new Iron Lady”. Truss advocates a Thatcherite program of a free market economy with low taxes and a small state as opposed to the Johnson Administration.
The former Minister of Commerce in the first two years of Johnson, who defended the permanence of the United Kingdom in the European Union, earned her recognition for her management of the compensation of the economic blow after the divorce with Brussels and negotiated dozens of new trade agreements .
Truss said Monday that Johnson had his “100% support” and urged his colleagues to back him.
Truss is also known for her social media activity. One of the most controversial of hers was her when she posted a photo on Instagram with the imitation on a visit to Estonia of the image of Margaret Thatcher aboard a tank with a headscarf.
Jeremy Hunt
He was responsible for the Foreign Affairs portfolio. Hunt, 55, finished second to Johnson in the 2019 leadership contest. He would offer a more serious and less controversial style of government than Johnson, in fact the two remain polar opposites. His weak point is being one of the Tories who opposed Brexit.
Over the past two years, Hunt has used his experience as a former health minister to chair Parliament’s health committee and has not been tarnished for having served in the current government.
Earlier this year, he said his ambition to become prime minister “hasn’t completely disappeared.” Hunt said he voted to oust Johnson in a confidence vote last month that the prime minister narrowly won.
Although he is often referred to as Johnson’s “safe” replacement, the moves by Sajid Javid (Health Minister until Tuesday) and Rishi Sunak (Finance Minister until Tuesday) have exposed his lack of audacity.
The YouGov firm places him in eighth place as an option to assume the leadership of the country and gives him 5% support, as does the newly appointed Finance Minister, Nadhim Zahawi.
ben wallace
Defense Minister Ben Wallace, 52, has become the most popular member of the government in recent months, according to Conservative Home, thanks to his handling of the Ukraine crisis, the shipment of weapons to kyiv and the evacuation from Afghanistan last year.
Of 716 members of the Conservative Party, Wallace, who has remained loyal to Jhonson until the last minute, has obtained 13% of the support in the opinion poll prepared by the YouGov firm, published this Thursday, July 7, leaving him in first place as potential prime minister.
He began his political career as a member of the Scottish Assembly Delegate in May 1999, before being first elected to the Westminster Parliament in 2005. He was then Minister for Security from 2016 until taking up his current role.
Rishi Sunak
Sunak, who resigned as finance minister last Tuesday saying the British public “rightly expects government to be conducted properly, competently and seriously”, was until last year the favorite to succeed Johnson.
He was praised for an economic rescue package in the fight against Covid-19, including a costly job retention program that averted a massive strike.
But Sunak later faced criticism for not giving enough support to raising the cost of living in British households. The revelations about the non-domiciled tax status of his millionaire wife and a fine that he received, along with Johnson for the ‘Partygate’ by breaking the rules of the anti-Covid confinement, have damaged his image.
The YouGov firm places the former head of finance with an intention of 10% to be prime minister.
His tax and spending budget last year put Britain on track for its biggest tax burden since the 1950s, undermining his claims to favor lower taxes.
Sajid Javid
Javid was Chancellor, Finance Minister until 2020 and in June of last year he assumed the Health portfolio. He was the first cabinet minister to resign last Tuesday and the line of his resignation letter was focused on the call for integrity as the axis and declared that “enough is enough” and that “the problem begins at the top” of the cabinet. Administration, referring to Johnson.
The son of Pakistani Muslim immigrant parents, he is a Thatcher admirer and finished fourth in the 2019 leadership contest to replace former Prime Minister Theresa May.
nadhim zahawi
The newly appointed finance minister, who succeeded Sunak, impressed as a vaccination manager when Britain had one of the world’s fastest launches against coronavirus.
Zahawi’s personal history as a former refugee from Iraq who came to Britain as a child sets him apart from other contenders.
He co-founded the polling company YouGov before entering Parliament in 2010. His last job was as Minister of Education. Zahawi said last week that it would be a “privilege” to be prime minister at some point.
Penny Mordaunt
The former defense minister, one of the biggest proponents of Brexit, was fired by Johnson when she became prime minister after she backed her rival Hunt during the last leadership contest.
In the latest Conservative Home poll, he appears as the second choice, behind Ben Wallace, current defense minister. And she is also ranked second with 12% by the firm YouGov, after Wallace.
Mordaunt, who had previously expressed loyalty to Johnson, has been one of the most outspoken critics of the prime minister over the ‘Partygate’ scandal.
Thomas TugendhatTom Tugendhat
The chairman of Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee was the first MP to declare his intention to enter a leadership contest in 2022.
Tugendhat, once a senior Army official, fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has been a regular critic of Johnson and would offer his party a clean break with previous governments as an option for moderate Conservatives. However, he has not been tested because he has never served in the cabinet.
with Reuters
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