Tory leadership race: Robert Jenrick tops ‘PopCon’ poll as favourite to lead party

Robert Jenrick has topped a Popular Conservatives poll as the favourite to lead the party in the Tory leadership race.

The former immigration minister got 38.3 per cent backing from those surveyed, beating rival and former business and trade Kemi Badenoch on 34.9 per cent.

It is the fourth so-called ‘PopCon’ poll Jenrick has won, which also saw respondents argue in favour of moving the Conservative Party to the right.

PopCon director Mark Littlewood said: “It is clear that the overwhelming majority of Tory members believe the party has drifted far too far to the soggy middle ground or even to the left of centre. 

“About nine in ten want a meaningful shift back to traditional, right of centre conservative territory.”

He added: “Whichever candidate makes the clearest commitment to such a reset of the party is likely to become party leader in November. 

“Our survey suggests Robert Jenrick is in pole position with Kemi Badenoch not far behind.”

Results from the panel found former home and foreign secretary James Cleverly had 6.8 per cent of support, compared to former security minister Tom Tugendhat, on 5.6 per cent.

In a direct head-to-head, the panel ultimately backed Jenrick, on 46 per cent, over Badenoch, on 41.3 per cent, while 12.8 per cent of respondents said they were yet to make up their minds.

The poll also found close to half – 48 per cent – of all respondents believe the current Tory Party is left of centre, with 32.6 per cent believing it is on the right.

But the vast majority, 89.6 per cent think the next leader should “move the party somewhat or significantly to the right”.

Almost 60 per cent said they supported creating a new role of elected deputy leader of the Conservatives, and more than 70 per cent think members should elect the party chairman.

Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg was the most popular choice for the role, as well as Dame Priti Patel, Lord Frost and Boris Johnson.

The findings correlated with the results of the second ballot of Tory MPs, which Jenrick won with 33 votes, followed by Badenoch on 28, and Cleverly and Tugendhat tied with 21 votes.

They will put forward their leadership pitches at the Tory party conference in Birmingham from 29 September to 2 October.

Conservative MPs will carry out further rounds of voting to select two final candidates for the party’s grassroots to choose between, with the result announced on November 2.