Tom Tugendhat emerged as the clear winner in the first live televised debate in the Tory leadership race, according to an early poll that put him well ahead of favorite Rishi Sunak.
The five candidates went head-to-head on Channel 4 on Friday night, with Mr Tugendhat narrowly surviving a second ballot the previous day, receiving the votes of just five Tory MPs more than Attorney-General Suella Braverman, who was eliminated.
His decision to fight back and take part in the televised debates appears to be paying off, as the Opinium poll of 1,159 people who watched Friday’s contest found that 36 percent thought the relatively unknown chairman of the foreign affairs committee performed the best – good.
That put him nine points ahead of Mr Sunack, the former chancellor, who looked most likely to make it to the bottom two after receiving 101 votes from Tory MPs on Thursday.
Penny Mordaunt, who is in second place after enjoying a remarkable surge of support from Tory MPs and is the clear favorite among Tory party members who will ultimately decide Boris Johnson’s successor, appeared to be less well received by the public during the debate on Friday.
The former defense secretary received just 12 per cent of the vote – the same share as former equalities minister Kemi Badenoch, a right-wing Tory MP who also has a relatively low public profile.
But the first debate appears to have gone most wrong for Liz Truss, the foreign secretary who, despite spending months advertising as a potential successor to Mr Johnson, now finds herself in third place behind Ms Mordaunt.
Ms Truss will be hoping Tory MPs disagree with the assessment of those polled by Opinium – just 6 per cent of whom believed she performed best in the debate – as she tries to woo the support of Mr Ms. Braverman and Ms. Badenoch to reach the final two.
But a breakdown of the Opinium poll by voter intentions suggests otherwise, showing that the Foreign Secretary is indeed last in Friday’s debate in the eyes of Conservative voters, Labor voters and voters alike.
However, the race was tighter at the top among Conservative voters than among the general population, with 29 per cent thinking Mr Tugendhat had performed best – putting him just one point ahead of Mr Sunak.
Ms Mordaunt and Ms Truss also enjoyed a slightly higher percentage of support for their performance on Friday among Tory voters, winning 18 and 10 per cent of the vote respectively, the pollster found.
It almost looked as if Ms Truss’s campaign team were looking to do damage control before the debate ended, with an unfortunately timed tweet from her official Twitter account which read: “Just walking – no you speak up – that’s really what rebuilds trust.”
Mr Tugendhat was the first of the five candidates to win a standing ovation from the Channel 4 studio audience after being the only contender to give a clear answer on whether they thought Mr Johnson was an honest man.
He quickly began shaking his head and answered “no” before host Krishnan Guru-Murthy finished the question.
Promising Channel 4 viewers a “clean start” which is his campaign slogan and calling for “a break from those Johnson years”, Mr Tugendhat added: “I’ve been holding a mirror up to a lot of our actions and asking those in our party , those in our leadership positions, to ask “is this what society really expects?”
“Are you serving the people of the UK or your career? Because that’s the real question tonight. That is the real question for all of us.”
Asked why people should trust him, the 49-year-old appeared to paraphrase Albus Dumbledore, the beloved headmaster of the Harry Potter series, telling viewers: “It’s easy to stand up to your enemies – sometimes it’s harder to stand up to your friends .”
But Mr. Tugendhat seemed to understand as he tried to hammer home Mr. Sunak’s core campaign message of being a responsible realist willing to make tough decisions.
Referring to a private conversation with the chancellor, Mr Tugendhat claimed Mr Sunak told him he only acted to increase national insurance contributions – thereby raising funds for health and social care – because Minister – the chairman asked him.
Meanwhile, a political forecaster suggested Ms Truss’ “implosion” during the debate could significantly “move the dial” in the leadership race.
“I’ve been following leadership debate markets professionally for more than 20 years and it’s rare that they move the dial more than a little bit,” said Leighton Vaughan Williams, professor of economics who heads Nottingham Business School’s political forecasting unit.
“That changed tonight when Liz Truss exploded. If she survives, let’s just cancel future debates.
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