Boris Johnson won't offer the Tories a 'calm, measured or serious government', says Andrew Marr

21 October 2022, 11:46 | Updated: 21 October 2022, 11:54

'Don't leave it up to the members!'

By Madeleine Wilson

Boris Johnson wouldn't offer the Tory party the "calm, measured, serious government" they need, Andrew Marr has said as the contest shapes up to be a fight between Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson.

This comes after Liz Truss resigned as Prime Minister and Tories have started picking their sides in the fresh battle for No.10.

The contest looks to be a fight between Rishi Sunak and the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who only left the role six weeks ago to be replaced by Liz Truss.

Mr Sunak had 35 backers by Friday morning, including Mr Johnson's former Deputy Prime Minister, Dominic Raab.

But Mr Johnson, who is flying back from his Caribbean, had garnered 20 backers, including his long-time fan Nadine Dorries and business secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Andrew Marr told Nick Ferrari that Boris Johnson would not offer the Conservative party the "calm, measured, serious government" they need to "steady the market".

Nick Ferrari asked Andrew: “What should the moral for these five days be for the country and for the Conservative Party?

Andrew replied: “Don't leave it up to the members!“

"The self-selected group of people, many of them very good, decent people, I'm sure but not necessarily political sophisticates.

“We are in a parliamentary democracy and you cannot have a parliamentary leader [that] the parliamentary party doesn't want.”

Boris Johnson would not offer the Conservative party the 'calm, measured, serious government' they need to 'steady the market'.

Andrew told Nick: "In future the Tory Party should go back to the old system of choosing their leaders on the basis of who their own MP’s want to lead and that’s the moral for them.

“The moral for the country is beware, look very carefully at these manifestos...People can promise us all sorts of things.”

Andrew went on: “Liz Truss was as it were, the opposite to that saying we could have all the tax cuts we wanted and that we didn't have to pay for it and old fashioned abacus economics.”

He later added: “We have to be realistic and a little bit cold blooded.”

READ MORE: Boris builds backing for shock comeback: Ex-PM 'to get backing from 100 Tory MPs' as he flies back to rally support.