Popular Conservatives: Who are the new Tory group launched by Liz Truss? What do the 'PopCons' stand for? Key figures, including Jacob Rees-Mogg

Led by former prime minister Liz Truss, the Popular Conservatives group is hoping to influence Government policy.

Former prime minister Liz Truss has launched a new movement within the Tories that warns “left-wing extremists” have taken control of UK institutions.

Calling themselves the “Popular Conservatives”, the group includes an array of MPs from the right-wing of the party, and aims to pressure Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on a range of issues.

To many it is regarded as a rebrand of Ms Truss’s wing of the party during her short-lived premiership, from which she resigned following a disastrous mini-budget and terrible polling. But who is in the Popular Conservatives and what do they believe?

Former prime minister Liz Truss following the launch of the Popular Conservatism movement at the Emmanuel Centre in central London.

Members

Despite being launched by Ms Truss, the group’s leader is officially Mark Littlewood, a former director of the libertarian free market Institute of Economic Affairs.

The launch event also featured former Cabinet minister Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg, who declared the “age of Davos man is over”, and ex-Tory deputy chairman Lee Anderson, who used his speech to argue that Britons did not care about the net-zero emissions strategy.

Others in the audience were former home secretary Priti Patel, ex-chief whip Wendy Morton, Brendan Clarke-Smith, Tory peer Lord Frost and Nigel Farage.

In a sign of the group’s politics, Mr Farage was also in attendance as a journalist, but praised as a Conservative by Mr Rees-Mogg.

Intentions

Perhaps ironically dubbed the "PopCons" by the media, the group claims not to be a protest movement against the existing Conservative leadership, which is why they declined to have MPs who had called for Mr Sunak to stand down speak at the event.

Instead, the group aims to lobby the government on culture war issues, and promise to give the public “freedom over their lives”. They are also deeply critical of "faceless" organisations, which they define as judges, quangos and international human rights institutions.

Immigration is also a cornerstone of their approach, with the group backing the Rwanda scheme, but urging Mr Sunak to exit the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) if it stands in the way of flights taking off.

The group is also supportive of tax cuts, and demanding an end to what they call “net zero zealotry”.

What did they say?

Mr Littlewood, the PopCons’ leader, said the group wanted to influence the Tory manifesto at the general election.

Insisting he was the leader, not Ms Truss, Mr Littlewood said: “She’s not the leader of it. I’m the director of it. I think the lessons we can draw from her very short time in office are important lessons for Conservatives who want to change Britain, want to see taxes come down.”

Mr Rees-Mogg said: “Domestically, we have seen power go from the democratic parts of the constitution to the appointed parts. This has made the government less responsive to the needs of the people and closer to those who have a hierarchical, internationalist view of government.

“Popular Conservatism is about restoring this balance and returning power to Parliament while taking it away from quangos and a judiciary that has become more political.”

Ms Truss said: “The fact is that democracy has become unfashionable. I believe the fundamental issue is that for years and years and years, Conservatives have not taken on the left-wing extremists.”