"Ken Clarke was tonight kicked out of the Conservative leadership contest, beaten into fourth place by a late surge for the rightwing candidate Liam Fox."Hardly surprising - Ken was always yesterday's man.
Cameron will hope to pick up Clarke's vote but I'm wondering if the description of him as 'the bookies' favourite' isn't the kiss of death? Michael Brown, the former Tory MP and now Independent columnist, predicted Portillo's defeat in favour of IDS before practically anyone else. His reasoning was that the history of Tory leadership battles showed the Tory party don't really like electing the frontrunner - the strange case of Michael Howard's accession excepted.
I'm not a betting man and I wouldn't offer a prediction but maybe those who got good odds on Liam Fox might be thinking their tenner is better placed for a return now than when they first put it on?
No comments:
Post a Comment