A new frontrunner has emerged in the Conservative Party leadership contest, a new poll has revealed.
The survey by Conservative Post, a group that advocates for greater democracy in the Tory Party, asked members to pick their top two choices for leader from a list of candidates that have indicated they will run.
The poll of 14,000 members, the largest yet, found Suella Braverman was the top choice.
The former Home Secretary secured more than double the first choice votes of any other candidate in the first five hours of the poll being launched on the Conservative Post site.
The poll of 14,000 members, the largest yet, found Suella Braverman was the top choice
PA
Braverman secured almost 800 of the 2266 votes cast so far.
If there was a vote tomorrow, the polling suggests that Braverman would win the leadership contest comfortably and replace Rishi Sunak as the new leader of the party.
The former Home Secretary was sacked by then-Prime Minister Sunak, for failing to get a Time article approved by No10 that accused the police of bias in the pro-Palestine marches.
The 1922 backbench committee has carefully planned for an extended leadership contest, that will see the final four candidates battle it out at the Conservative Party conference, with a winner being announced on November 2.
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Conservative Post poll on Tory leadership contest
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Speaking to GB News, Conservative Post founder Claire Bullivant said: “The Conservative Post poll shows Suella is currently the clear favourite among party members and for that reason, she should be on the leadership ballot.
“If the MPs give us two One Nation wets or someone the members clearly don't want, then the party is doomed.
“If that happens, we will have no members left soon.
“To save our party, MPs need to start listening.
“When the leader is popular with party members, our party is stable and united. The army gets to work.
“Think of Thatcher in the mid-80s, or Boris, especially in his first six months.”
Rishi Sunak's replacement will officially be selected on November 2
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Other potential candidates for the leadership fared less well with rival Kemi Badenoch coming a distant second, and former Home Secretary James Cleverley coming last in this ongoing poll of members.
In response, Bullivant said: “When the party ignores or defies its core voters, it becomes unpopular.
“This has been so apparent with Sunak, and we've seen it all first-hand... the whole machine backfires.
“Members go on strike and civil war descends. Members tell me every day they have never felt so ignored and disenfranchised as they have in recent years.
“One recently said: 'They want my time, my money and my effort but they don't want my opinions. If they don't listen to me now, I'm gone, and I've been a member for over 50 years. It's time to send out the lifeboats and bring the members home, many of whom are currently camped out at Reform. Conservative members are screaming. They want Suella on the ballot. Are the MPs listening?'”
Leadership candidates can use the summer break to travel the country to pitch for members' votes.
The first four ballots, in which MPs eliminate candidates for the top job, will take place when MPs return at the start of September, narrowing down the candidates to only four by the start of the Conservative conference at the end of September.
