The flags are waving, the starting gun has fired and we are off. The Tory leadership race to replace David Cameron (and become Prime Minister) has begun. Introducing the starters at the line:
Stephen Crabb MP Liam Fox MP Theresa May MP Michael Gove MP Andrea Leadsom MP Boris John- It appears, to the surprise of everyone, that Boris Johnson will not be running for Tory leader and therefore won't be Prime Minister. To some, a sigh of relief. Others, sadness that someone with such potential won't be at the forefront of British politics. To me, just a shock really. For months and months everyone has suspected that the former Mayor of London was going to put his name forward to be PM. Some people probably voted Leave to get Boris in! The second David Cameron resigned, you could ask any person on the street and they though he was guaranteed to get the job. So what changed? Why did someone, clearly with lots of ambition and grit, just drop out all of a sudden? Well, if you look behind the curtain, maybe the whole thing isn't such a surprise after all. When Boris Johnson came out in support of Brexit on that cold February evening, some were shocked, as he had clearly shown support for the EU previously. He himself admitted that he had written 2 columns for his weekly Telegraph column, one for Remain and the other for Brexit, because of how hard the decision was. But what we he making his mind up about. Whether to stay or leave? Or what the best move was for him, strategically? Boris may have thought that been on the opposing side to the Prime Minister may have given him a better chance to become PM himself, as the leave vote would force David Cameron out. Being on the opposing side could also help to galvanize support and motivate people to want his ideas to be a reality with HIM leading them. However, I think there would 2 flaws. Firstly, I don't think Boris though we would actually leave, because the British people are very good at sticking with the status quo. Secondly, I don't think Boris therefore wanted the responsibility of dealing with the fallout: taking us out of the EU, negotiating a whole new load of trade deals and taking the country. Yes, he probably wanted to be Prime Minister, but certainly not in these circumstances. Just before announcing his non-bid, Johnson's ally and fellow Brexiter, Michael Gove, announced that he was no longer supporting Boris and planned to run for leader himself. Before this, everyone had expected Boris to be PM and Gove to be his No 2. It must have a been a serious blow to lose his key ally, a concise, articulate strategist who had previous Government experience. Johnson may have panicked about to run against another Leave supporter, as the Brexit vote among the Tory party could be split. Apart from Gove, we didn't really hear of any other key Boris allies, so to lose Gove would leave us to guess who was supporting Boris? Though Boris could go on, maybe losing Michael was too much to carry on and go it alone. As ever, this is all complete guess, but seems a strange coincidence. Lastly, if you're a politics nerd like myself, recent opinion polls for Leader of Tory party have shown Theresa May ahead in all sampling i.e. conservative voters, general public etc. Before the vote, Boris appeared ahead, so would have been saddened to have lost support among voters as time went on. Maybe he just didn't want to run for fear of losing. Then again, after the recent polling disasters, (General election 2015 and failing to predict a Leave vote) who's ever going to trust opinion polling ever again? So what should happen now? Personally, I support Theresa May, as she has been a successful Home Secretary and would do the job as best as possible. She seems like the secure, correct choice. After Michael Gove's disaster as Education Secretary, I'm not sure Conservative members would want him as leader, though he is Eurosceptic, which they would like. Stephen Crabb has potential, but as I mentioned on my Twitter, his link with anti gay groups are extremely regressive. As for the rest of them, who knows? I'm sure this will not be the last we see of Boris Johnson. All we do know though is that politics has been shaken like a champagne bottle. Let the simmering down begin.
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