Boris Johnson latest news: Patel pulls out of committee grilling over ‘changes in government’

Alok Sharma, the former business minister who acted as president of the Cop26 climate conference, has warned Tory leadership hopefuls not to backslide on the net zero.

“Economically, environmentally and electorally it would be a retrograde step for us to resile from this policy. It’s a road to nowhere,” he told the i newspaper.

Asked if frontrunner Rishi Sunak is fully behind policies aimed at achieving net zero emissions by 2050, he said: “I will wait to see what all the candidates say on this particular issue, which is very important for me.

”Contender Kemi Badenoch branded the net zero target “unilateral economic disarmament”, while rival Suella Braverman said the Tories should “suspend the all-consuming desire to achieve net zero by 2050”.

The first round of ballot papers will be handed out today to eliminate the least-favoured candidates.

Voting will take place at about lunchtime and will last for a few hours until a result is announced at 5pm.

Any of the eight candidates with fewer than 30 votes will be eliminated from the contest.

The process is set to be repeated on Thursday.

Home secretary Priti Patel was due to be questioned by MPs on the Commons Home Affairs Committee today but has pulled out.

The committee said in a tweet: “This morning at 10.00am we were due to be questioning the Home Secretary, Priti Patel. She has declined to attend our session.”

Tory leadership hopeful Nadhim Zahawi has said he would “certainly” give Boris Johnson a Cabinet role if he became PM.

The chancellor insisted he remained loyal to Mr Johnson, despite publicly urging him to stand down last week.

“Boris Johnson is a friend of mine for 30 years,” Mr Zahawi told LBC this morning.

“If he wishes to serve in Cabinet then I would certainly offer him a job.”

Read the full story here by Adam Forrest

Grant Shapps dropped out of the leadership contest and backed “another candidate [that] had the right policy”, he said this morning.

The transport secretary is supporting former chancellor Rishi Sunak to become prime minister.

Yesterday, candidates needed at least 20 nominations to get through to the first round of ballot voting to take place today.

Mr Shapps told Sky News that he would have received enough nominations under the old rules, but that he was unlikely to under the new rules.

The European Research Group (ERG) chairman Mark Francois is reportedly backing foreign secretary Liz Truss to become prime minister.

The group of Brexit-supporting Tory MPs will be meeting at midday today to decide who to back, according to The Daily Telegraph.

Manchester mayor Andy Burnham said the government’s “levelling up” plan “will be dead” if Rishi Sunak becomes prime minister.

It comes after former chancellor Mr Sunak pledged to run the economy like Margaret Thatcher.

But Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg doesn’t think Mr Sunak is conservative enough, dubbing him the “socialist chancellor”.

Asked if Mr Sunak is a “socialist”, former Labour MP Mr Burnham told Sky News: “No, certainly not. He is in the newspapers today saying that he will govern like Margaret Thatcher if he is elected leader.

“Margaret Thatcher laid the North of England low when she was in government so I think we could confidently say that levelling up will be dead if he is elected and continues to put that kind of approach forward.”

Jacob Rees-Mogg has explained why he’s backing Liz Truss for the leadership, Adam Forrest writes.

“I cabinet Liz was the most supportive cabinet minister in getting Brexit opportunities,” he told Sky News.

The Brexit opportunities minister added: “She also opposed the endless tax rises of the former chancellor, which I think have been economically damaging.”

In another dig at Mr Sunak, Mr Rees-Mogg said loyalty was “extremely important” to him.

Asked how long Ms Truss had been planning a leadership campaign, he responded: “She may have had drinks with MPs and meetings, but that’s the routine business of cabinet ministers. Even I had drinks parties with other MPs – when I was allowed to.”

Referring to Mr Sunak registering his campaign website back in December – as first reported by The Independent – he added: “It’s not setting up a website, it’s not getting ready in December … that’s a different order of magnitude.”

Asked if he would take a cabinet post from Mr Sunak if became PM, Mr Rees-Mogg said: “No, of course I wouldn’t. I believe his behaviour towards Boris Johnson, his disloyalty, means I could not possibly support him.”

Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi has explained why he called for Boris Johnson to resign last week.

It comes as many Tory MPs loyal to the embattled prime minister have accused ministers of having “betrayed” him.

Mr Zahawi told the BBC that he had accepted the role of chancellor two days before urging Mr Johnson to resign because he wanted to “put country first”.

But, he said, he realised the following day that “we couldn’t realistically have a functioning government”.

“I went to Boris Johnson and explained he was in danger of being humiliated, and I didn’t want to see him being put through that,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

“He’s a friend of 30 years. The next morning. I felt the only thing I could do was write a letter to him, to remind of our conversation and ask him to do the right thing. And I think he did the right thing ultimately.”

Transport secretary Grant Shapps has denied Rishi Sunak’s Tory leadership campaign has engaged in “dirty tricks”.

Culture secretary Nadine Dorries, a Boris Johnson loyalist, accused the former chancellor’s team of using the “dark arts”.

Her criticism came following claims that Mr Sunak’s team tried to “siphon off” votes to ensure Jeremy Hunt got through because they believed Mr Sunak would beat him in a final vote of party members.

Speaking on Sky News, Mr Shapps, who dropped out of the race to support Mr Sunak, rejected Ms Dorries’ claim.

He said: “Simply, in this case it just didn’t happen. Jeremy Hunt himself has said everybody on his nomination paper is somebody who is very close to his campaign. So even he has rubbished it.”