The Conservatives are in for a crushing defeat in the Wakefield by-election according to new polling, as reports suggest Boris Johnson could face a vote on his future.
The prime minister secured his majority of 80 seats at the 2019 general election off the back of scalps in the so-called red wall – traditional Labour-supporting areas in the north of England, the Midlands and Wales.
But with Wakefield scheduled to go to the polls on 23 June to elect a new MP after former Tory incumbent Imran Ahmad Khan was found guilty of sexual assault, fresh polling is likely to make for worrying reading in the Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ).
A survey by JL Partners and reported in TheSunday Times gives Labour a 20-point lead over the Tories in Wakefield, a constituency which before the 2019 result had consistently voted for a candidate wearing a red rosette since the 1930s.
The poll puts Labour on 48 per cent and the Tories on 28 per cent – down by 19 points.
James Johnson, co-founder of the organisation and a former Downing Street pollster during Theresa May’s tenure, said the Conservatives are “behind Labour in every age group apart from the over-65s”, with polling day less than three weeks away.
The polling expert said the top reason voters in Wakefield swung to Labour was because “Boris Johnson tried to cover-up Partygate, and lied to the public”.
The second most popular reason for opting for Sir Keir Starmer’s party was because they saw Mr Johnson as being out of touch with the working class.
The result could pile more pressure on the prime minister, who faces a second test in the Tiverton and Honiton by-election on the same day as Wakefield, in the wake of the revelations about lockdown-busting parties in No 10.
The Sunday Times said it had been told by one rebel they had privately tallied as many as 67 letters of no confidence had been submitted to Sir Graham Brady, the chair of the 1922 Committee of backbench Tories, which would mean the threshold of 54 has been reached.
According to the newspaper, a vote on the future of Mr Johnson’s premiership could take place as soon as Wednesday.
The rebels would need 180 voters to remove the prime minister from power, otherwise affording him, by the current rules, a year’s stay of execution before another bid to oust him can be held.
But, according to an unnamed minister quoted by The Times on Saturday, Mr Johnson might not be able to rely on the ministers, whips and aides on the government’s payroll – said to be around 140 people – to prop him up during such a vote.
The newspaper quoted an anonymous minister as saying they “don’t know” if they “can vote confidence in him”.
The person is quoted as saying: “I haven’t had any confidence in him for a long time, but I never thought we’d get to a confidence vote.
“And then there’s whether I can lie in public and I say I voted confidence. I don’t know whether I can.”
It is not only Tory MPs that have publicly voiced their displeasure at the prime minister following the publication of Sue Gray’s report into the lockdown gatherings in Downing Street and Whitehall.
The prime minister was booed by some in the crowd as he arrived with his wife, Carrie Johnson, to attend the national service of thanksgiving for the Queen at St Paul’s Cathedral on Friday as part the platinum jubilee celebrations.
Additional reporting from agencies
The prime minister faces a second test in the Tiverton and Honiton by-election on the same day as Wakefield
