Nadine Dorries stokes Tory civil war as Rishi Sunak faces fresh by-election blow

Nadine Dorries Reveals Why She Decided To Step Down With 'Immediate Effect'

Nadine Dorries is likely to delay her official resignation in order to draw out the pain for Rishi Sunak.

If she delays her resignation to the summer recess, this would push a by-election in her constituency into the Autumn.

Not only would this mean the byelection falls in the leadup to the Conservative Party conference, but it also means Rishi Sunak will have to fight by-elections on two separate days.

While Ms Dorries has announced her intention to resign with “immediate effect”, she is yet to complete the formal process of stepping down.

Only if Ms Dorries tenders her resignation soon will the party be able to have all three byelections on the same day.

Boris Johnson and ally Nigel Adams, who announced their resignations last week, have both completed the formal process of stepping down.

A Tory source told The Independent: “We don’t know why Nadine hasn’t resigned. She said she was going with ‘immediate effect’ on Friday afternoon before Boris and Nigel, but didn’t.

“But we don’t want to wait around, we want to get on with these things.”

It is thought that Ms Dorries is attempting to undermine Mr Sunak’s authority after the former minister launched a scathing attack on the PM earlier this week.

She claimed he is a “privileged posh boy” who “duplicitously and cruelly” stopped her from joining the House of Lords.

Ms Dorries was expected to be awarded a peerage on Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list but was nowhere to be seen.

She stood down just hours before the list was published.

The former Culture Secretary had previously insisted that she did not want to trigger a by-election.

Speaking to TalkTV about why she changed her mind, she said: “I can’t reveal everything. something significant did happen to change my mind.

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“I’m not going to go blabbing about what happened. I need to process things.

“Something did do and I think it’s for the best.”

She added: “I’m not altogether comfortable with how the party has conducted itself in the past year” – referring to the way in which Boris Johnson was ousted from his post.

She won a 24,664 strong majority in 2019 in Mid Bedfordshire but with Labour so far ahead in the polls, any by-election will be a test for Mr Sunak’s Government.

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