Tory MPs cast ballots: Theresa May awaits confidence vote result

The United Kingdom (UK) prime minister made a last-minute appeal for support at an emotional meeting of backbench MPs.

Conservative MPs are voting on whether Theresa May should stay as their leader with a result expected after 20:00 GMT.

She told them she will not lead the party into the next scheduled election in 2022 – but wants to stay on to deliver her Brexit deal, MPs said.

She faces a vote of confidence in her leadership after 48 Conservative MPs called for one to be held.

The majority of Conservative MPs have publicly said they will support the PM but it is a secret ballot and there were signs of nerves among party managers ahead of the vote in Committee Room 14 at the Palace of Westminster.

A result is expected fairly quickly after the voting finishes at 20:00 GMT.

The prime minister was greeted with applause, and the traditional banging of desks, as she went in to the committee room to address her MPs. Some of them were reported to be in tears.

She is understood to have promised not to call a “snap general election” and told MPs that in her heart she would have liked to have led them into the next scheduled election, partly because of what had happened at last year’s election, when she lost her majority.

But, she added: “I realise that the party would like a different leader to take them into that election.”

Cabinet minister Amber Rudd said “she was very clear that she wont be taking the general election in 2022”.

But Jacob Rees-Mogg, a key figure in the campaign to oust Mrs May, said she had received a “half-hearted” reception from MPs.

She had said it was not her “intention” to fight the next election, added Mr Rees-Mogg, which he said was a “politician’s word”.

 

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