Tory turmoil: Boris Johnson says questions over his leadership 'settled'

Boris Johnson has said questions over his leadership have been “settled” as one Cabinet minister insisted the Prime Minister still enjoyed the support of senior colleagues.

The Prime Minister, attending the G7 summit in Germany, brushed off reports that Tory MPs were continuing to plot against him in the wake of last week’s twin by-election defeats.

Asked if he was concerned about events at home, Mr Johnson insisted the matter had been dealt with in the confidence vote earlier this month which he won, despite 40 per cent of his MPs voting to get rid of him.

US president Joe Biden and Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson, right, chat as they gather for a group photo at Castle Elmau in Kruen, near Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, on Sunday. Picture: Brendan Smialowski/Pool via AP

“We settled that a couple of weeks ago,” he told reporters.

“What I’m focused on, and what we’re doing is getting on with, number one, all the stuff we’re doing to help people with the cost of living in the short term.”

Mr Johnson, however, fuelled anger among his critics on the backbenches with his suggestion over the weekend that far from considering standing aside, he was hoping for a third term as Prime Minister carrying on into the 2030s.

His comments have reportedly prompted a fresh wave of MPs to submit letters calling for another confidence vote in his leadership.

Although under existing rules Mr Johnson is supposed to be safe from a challenge for another year, there is speculation those rules could be re-written if there is sufficient pressure from Conservative MPs for him to go.

Mr Johnson told the BBC he still had the authority to deliver on the Government’s agenda despite the renewed calls for him to quit.

Speaking at the G7 summit in Germany, the Prime Minister said: “I not only have the authority, I’ve got a new mandate from my party, which I’m absolutely delighted about.”

He added: “I’m focused on what I’m doing as a leader of the country, and it’s driving a massive, massive agenda.

“That is a huge, huge privilege to do. Nobody abandons a privilege like that.

“Because this is something that the electorate – the mandate that the electorate gave us in 2019, there hasn’t been a mandate like it for the Conservative Party for 40 years.”

Environment secretary George Eustice defended Mr Johnson’s earlier remarks, during the Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Rwanda, saying he had been making the point there was a “lot he wants to do”.

“I sometimes feel in these situations that prime ministers can’t win,” Mr Eustice told Times Radio.

“They either say that they want to carry on and they’ve got a lot to do and they want to keep going. And that’s what obviously Margaret Thatcher said and what Boris Johnson is perceived to have said.

“Or like Tony Blair, they say they’re not going to go on and on and people spend years arguing about the date of their departure.”

Despite the resignation of Tory Party co-chairman Oliver Dowden in the wake of the by-election losses in Wakefield and in Tiverton and Honiton, Mr Eustice insisted the rest of the Cabinet continued to back their leader.

But the expressions of discontent have kept on coming, with Damian Green, who chairs the One Nation caucus of Tory MPs, warning the Government “needs to alter both its style and content” and calling on Cabinet members with leadership hopes to show their stripes.