Conservative Party Leadership: Ballot three

Following Dominic Raab's elimination there were 30 MPs up for grabs. The results were as follows:

1. Boris Johnson = 143
2. Jeremy Hunt = 54
3. Michael Gove = 51
4. Sajid Javid = 38
5. Rory Stewart = 27

Now with every candidate being eliminated you would expect the surviving candidates to receive more backings. This has occurred for everyone in every round so far, except for the eliminated candidate from the third ballot, Rory Stewart. Stewart was the outsider from the get-go but did receive important backers such as Ken Clarke, Dominic Grieve and David Guake as well as David Lingington when Hancock withdrew. Stewart only just made it into the second ballot, but in that second ballot he performed incredibly well, coming fourth of the six. He has now lost 10 MP backers, perhaps after his lackluster appearance on the BBC debate yesterday. Javid, who only just made it through to this round, has managed survive another ballot.

With Rory's lost 10 and Raab's 30 MPs up for grabs the number of gains are as follows

Boris Johnson = 17
Jeremy Hunt = 9
Michael Gove = 10
Sajid Javid = 5
Rory Stewart = -10

Looking at the results and the top three remain the same in the same order, however this could still change in terms of the second place. Hunt has always been closely followed by Gove, and that gap has lowered by 1 MP each ballot. Stewart's backers are likely to go to either Gove or Hunt which means that, due to the small difference in numbers between them, the second place candidate is not as confidently assuring as the winner.

On the other hand, Javid is unlikely to survive the next round, although I said that for this one. There is now a somewhat comfortable margin of lead of Gove and Hunt above Javid, so it is unlikely that that will grow. However, there are now 27 more MPs up for grabs, which if some did go to Javid, would see a rise in support from him making it even more unclear on who will survive.

Boris Johnson has seen a rise in support, and the most amount of new backers. This is not surprising, as Raab endorsed Johnson himself (logically unlike Hancock) and his backers are likely to follow due to the similar Brexit stance. Javid's elimination is key for Gove and Hunt in terms of which one of them will face Boris for the membership vote, which arguably they will definitely lose.

The next round of votes is tomorrow, where another candidate will be eliminated...