Boris Johnson has this evening survived a vote of no confidence after Conservative MPs backed him to stay as leader in a secret ballot.
The vote was called after the chair of the 1922 Committee Sir Graham Brady revealed the threshold of 54 letters of no confidence had been met.
Boris Johnson won the vote with 211 for and 148 against. This figure is worse than a similar vote former leader Theresa May suffered in 2018, where she resigned just six months later.
To survive, Boris Johnson needed a simple majority – or 180 votes – of support from his 359 fellow party members.
The outcome was decided through a secret ballot held between 6-8pm this evening in committee room at the Palace of Westminster.
It is only a couple of years since the PM and the Conservative Party won a big majority at a General Election. It is not right that his mandate might be ended in this way. Instead of turning inwards, we have to focus on what matters to the public and get on with the job.
— Robert Buckland (@RobertBuckland) June 6, 2022
The last no-confidence vote was in December 2018 when Theresa May won the vote by 200 to 117, but resigned a short time later.
Due to this evenings result he is now immune from another no confidence vote for a year.
