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Cock-up, rather than conspiracy, the likely cause of Cleverly’s surprise exit | Conservative leadership | The Guardian

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Whenever something unexpected happens in politics, two questions immediately arise: how the hell did it happen, and what does it mean? With the latest twist in the Conservative leadership race, the first of these at least presents no obvious answers. James Cleverly would have gone to bed on Tuesday night overwhelmingly confident he would progress to the final two of the contest. He had topped the third round of voting by Tory MPs, had clear momentum, and was the bookmakers’ favourite. Those certainties came crashing down at 3.30pm on Wednesday, as the result of the fourth and final round of the parliamentary vote was read out to assembled journalists and MPs: Cleverly had somehow lost two votes, and was out of the race. Tory members will instead pick from Kemi Badenoch and Robert Jenrick. This was a turnaround in fate both sudden and unexpected. Cleverly, widely seen as the star of last week’s Tory conference, had on Tuesday been just one short of the 40 MPs backers needed to guarantee

James Cleverly had clear momentum, and was the bookmakers’ favourite – until he lost out in the fourth and final round of the parliamentary vote. Photograph: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images View image in fullscreen James Cleverly had clear momentum, and was the bookmakers’ favourite – until he lost out in the fourth and final round of the parliamentary vote. Photograph: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images Conservative leadership This article is more than 1 year old Analysis Cock-up, rather than conspiracy, the likely cause of Cleverly’s surprise exit This article is more than 1 year old Peter Walker

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