Boris Johnson has been lying fairly low since the Brexit vote but that does not mean he has not been plotting. A group of Tory MPs have been working furiously on his behalf trying to drum up support for his leadership bid, expected to be announced Thursday.
Many MPs who supported the leave EU campaign have already pledged their backing for Johnson’s candidacy, and allies say he is already heading towards three-figure support from the 330 Tory MPs in parliament.
Johnson has been also personally seeing many senior figures who are wavering over whether to lend him their vote or get behind the “Stop Boris” candidate, Theresa May, who gave her support to the remain camp.
Steve Baker, chair of the Conservatives for Britain group, which was instrumental in the leave victory, said it was not a clear-cut victory for Johnson but he was the “best hope” for delivering the verdict of the EU referendum, running on a joint ticket with Michael Gove, the justice secretary.
“Boris has got a very good chance and at the moment I would expect it would be quite close between Boris and Theresa. But I’m backing Boris because he’s got the charisma, character, energy and optimism to see us through in the right way,” Baker said. “The combination of Boris, Michael and other top figures is the combination in which I have the most confidence.”
The atmosphere is so febrile in parliament that Portcullis House, the Westminster atrium where MPs gather and talk, is full of politicians with lists of names for each side in their pocket as they try to decide which way the wind is blowing before they choose who to back.
MPs are not moving in entirely predictable ways. A string of modernisers are swinging behind Stephen Crabb, the work and pensions secretary and remain campaigner running on a blue-collar Conservativism ticket. Some leavers, such as Mike Penning, a Home Office minister, are supporting May and a larger number of remainers, including Liz Truss, the environment secretary, are backing Johnson.
Johnson even tried to woo May herself in a deal broken by MPs on either side, but aides have rebutted that saying she is “in it to win it”. She did not appear for a meeting with Johnson on Monday, leaving him waiting for 40 minutes. Her side claims that was a diary mixup as she had never intended to attend.
A number of modernising Conservative MPs, many of them women, said they were uniting against Johnson because they were angry about the way he behaved during the EU referendum campaign. “I never thought I’d be backing Theresa May for the next leader but that’s the only way we can stop him,” one said.
In this climate, Team Boris is by no means complacent about winning, especially given the favourite’s historic tendency to lose Tory leadership elections and a ConservativeHome survey suggesting May could have overtaken him by 29% to 28% among the website’s grassroots members who took part.
While MPs will choose a shortlist of two candidates, it will be the party’s 150,000-odd members who take the final decision in a postal ballot, with the result announced on 9 September.
This has given the jitters to a number of Johnson backers, who are anxious for other potential leave candidates, like Andrea Leadsom, to swing behind him. Liam Fox, a more rightwing Brexiter than the others and a former defence secretary, has already declared himself a candidate.
“This ABB campaign – Anyone But Boris – is actually ‘anything but Brexit’,” said one Tory MP, a leave campaigner. “I really would like Boris to reach out to Andrea and Liam and unite, otherwise I think we could be in danger. They could split vote between them. It’s clear Theresa May has got a lot of the current payroll voter and resources behind her.”
Leadsom said on Wednesday afternoon that she was still considering whether to run; she believed the successful candidate had to be someone who backed Brexit.
Another leave MP said they would like Leadsom to have a senior position under Johnson and put party above personal ambition, given the former London mayor was clearly ahead.
While working on his leadership bid Johnson has attracted criticism for failing to make any public appearances since his sombre press conference on Friday morning, alongside Michael Gove and Gisela Stuart immediately after the Brexit victory.
He spent part of the weekend playing cricket and another part holed up in his country home with MPs, including Jake Berry, Ben Wallace and Amanda Milling, working on his leadership bid. His sole pronouncement, in his regular column in the Telegraph, also managed to cause alarm among some fellow leave campaigners because it seemed to leave open the possibility of sticking with free movement of people from the EU.
However, since then, his camp has clarified to Tory MPs that border control will be a red line of his campaign, along with not holding a snap election – to calm those Tory MPs who have only recently won swing seats.
Although he has not been present to support David Cameron in the Commons, for either the statement on the EU referendum or at prime minister’s questions, Johnson has been spotted with a large entourage in parliament. This week, he met Lynton Crosby, the electoral strategist who helped the Conservatives to victory last year and whose company Crosby, Textor, Fullbrook, was involved in Zac Goldsmith’s mayoral campaign.
An email sent by Gove’s wife by mistake also revealed that her husband has been locked in talks with Johnson about what role he would have in the government if they won.
Johnson’s absence from the public eye this week will be shortlived. After he announces his candidacy on Thursday morning, he will be rarely off the airwaves and podiums as he makes the case to MPs, members and the country that he has the qualities required for the role of prime minister.
