Kemi And Rishi Show Up Labour's Lamentable Record

It’s easy to mock the number of would-be candidates for the Conservative leadership. As I write, there are 11 standing, with talk that another two are considering joining in.

- Stephen Pollard

Today should hopefully separate the wheat from the chaff, as the no-hopers drop out if they fail to get enough MPs to nominate them.

And yes, it’s ludicrous. Some of these people aren’t even known in their own constituencies. In what universe does Rehman Chishti, who has spent his 12 years as a backbench MP in well-merited obscurity (until being made a Foreign Office minister last week) think the nation is waiting to acclaim him as our next PM?

In reality, most know they won’t win. They’re standing because they hope to ensure a Cabinet job under whoever is victorious. But once you’ve stopped laughing at the idea of some of them becoming prime minister, there is a significant and deeper point to the variety of names put forward.

Of the 11 MPs so far declared, seven are from ethnic minorities – front runner Rishi Sunak, Nadhim Zahawi, Sajid Javid, Suella Braverman, Kemi Badenoch, Mr Chishti and Grant Shapps. And of the four women, three are serious contenders – Badenoch, Liz Truss and Penny Mordaunt.

THIS is a truly diverse list – and naturally so, without any quotas or prescriptive rules about the numbers who must make up any contest. There is nothing tokenistic about this list.