Knives out for defeated Rishi, as Tory leadership race begins: Ousted Penny Mordaunt, Grant Shapps and Jacob Rees-Mogg accuse Sunak of 'throwing away public trust' - as Suella kickstarts her campaign to take over

The Tories today blamed Rishi Sunak for the party's electoral rout as Suella Braverman used her victory speech to kickstart her campaign to be the next leader.

Mr Sunak is being blamed for the Tory collapse and is already facing the wrath of senior Conservatives, many of whom slammed his decision to call a July election.

He is expected to resign today but could stay on as leader over the summer to stave off a civil war caused by the worst general election result in modern history.

And his former home secretary Ms Braverman hasn't wasted any time to show she is ready to launch a leadership bid during her speech after winning the Fareham and Waterlooville seat.

She vowed to 'rebuild trust' and apologised for her party's failings, declaring:  'I'm sorry that my party didn't listen to you. The Conservative Party has let you down.

'You, the great British people, voted for us over 14 years and we did not keep our promises. I will do everything in my power to rebuild trust. We need to listen to you, you have spoken to us very clearly'.

Ms Braverman is fourth favourite to be the next Tory leader, according to bookmakers. Kemi Badenoch is favourite, followed by Priti Patel and centrist Tory Tom Tugendhat. James Cleverly, who held his Essex seat, is next before Nigel Farage, who was elected as a Reform MP for the first time today.

Amongst those humiliated was Liz Truss, who lost her seat but had been tipped to launch another leadership bid had she held South West Norfolk. 

Grant Shapps said his party's troubles had turned into an endless 'soap opera' and said the Conservatives had 'lost' the election rather than Labour winning it having 'tried the patience' of the public by being divided. 

Penny Mordaunt said the Tories had thrown away the public's trust and lost sight of the public's values. 

Jacob Rees-Mogg, who lost his seat, was amongst those who blamed the ousting of Boris Johnson for the party's electoral drubbing while James Cleverly appeared to take aim at the Tory's Rwanda policy, saying his party had pursued 'thin solutions to challenging and complex problems'. 

Outgoing Home Secretary Mr Cleverly said: 'This has been a very difficult night for my party and losing the position of government of this country is painful, but it is the nature of our democracy that it happens.

'And when it happens it is incumbent upon I suppose all parties, but particularly the party leaving government, to listen carefully to what the voters are telling us.

'I am not going to rush to any quick judgments. I think the right thing to do is be thoughtful and take a short period of time to really assess what the voters are telling us, but it is clear that, when you see the vote share of the traditional main parties of government, that many voters are disillusioned with all of us.

'And we should take that on board.

'I think it is also right that we have the humility to recognise that there is nothing honourable in presenting simple and thin solutions to challenging and complex problems, and the world is a difficult and dangerous place, and we have to respond to that.'

Penny Mordaunt was set to run for the party leadership again had she managed to keep her Portsmouth North seat - but she lost by 780 votes.

She said: 'Tonight, the Conservative Party has taken a battering because it failed to honour the trust that people had placed in it. You can speak all you like of security and freedom, but you can't have either if you are afraid.

'Afraid about the cost-of-living or accessing healthcare, or whether the responsibility you shoulder will be recognised and rewarded. That fear steals the future, and it only makes the present matter and that is why we lost.

'Our renewal as a party and a country will not be achieved by us talking to an ever smaller slice of ourselves but being guided by the people of our country. And if we want again to be the natural party of government, then our values must be the people's.

'I've lost many good colleagues tonight but I hope that like me they intend to carry on serving their communities with even stronger heart, our country needs all of us.'

Defence Secretary Grant Shapps, in a speech after his loss was announced in Welwyn Hatfield, said he had the 'honour to serve in more cabinet posts than most'.

He criticised the Tories' 'inability to iron out their differences' amid an endless 'soap opera'.

He added: 'There's a danger that we now go off on some tangent condemning the public' to a 'lacklustre' opposition.

Mr Shapps warned: 'We should be clear about what went wrong and put it right.'

The party has been routed by Labour and a jubilant Sir Keir Starmer, who will be the next Prime Minister after his party won a landslide with a massive helping hand from Reform and the Liberal Democrats.

Sir Keir trumpeted his victory at a rally in central London after the party formally crested the 325 seats needed to control the Commons.

Last night sources suggested Rishi Sunak would do 'whatever is best' for the party to ensure stability through a leadership contest – likely to finish in September or October.

Jacob Rees-Mogg said it had been a 'terrible night' for the Tories while Andrea Leadsom claimed the party had 'not been Conservative enough'.

Sir Jacob said there were 'issues with changing leader', meaning the party had taken its 'core vote for granted'. The former Conservative business secretary told the BBC: 'There's no way of describing this as anything other than a bad night for the Conservative party.'

Asked where it went wrong, he added: 'Voters expect the prime minister they have chosen to remain the prime minister and for it to be the voters who decide when that person is changed, rather than it being done by a small cabal.

'I'm afraid I think the party took its core vote for granted, which is why you see so many people who may have voted Conservative previously, going off to Reform.'

Former Tory chairman Brandon Lewis also blamed the ousting of Mr Johnson, saying it was the 'one moment' where the polls 'changed dramatically and never came back'.

He told GB News: 'It's when a group of MPs decided to override the mandate that Boris Johnson was given by the public, not just our members overwhelmingly, but the British public.'

Sir Brandon, who decided to stand down from Parliament at the election, also said Mr Sunak would 'go down as the Conservative Prime Minister and leader who had the worst election result in over a century'.

Ex-Tory Cabinet minister Dame Andrea Jenkyns suggested the party had suffered because 'we've not been Conservative enough' with people thinking the party is 'not normal'.

And Welsh Conservative Senedd leader Andrew RT Davies told BBC Wales he was angry at Mr Sunak's decision to hold a July election.

'I have no words that can describe my frustration at some points of the campaign,' he said. Speaking after the exit poll was published, former Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson told Sky News: 'This is a massacre. There's no dressing this up.

'We upset pensioners by making the cut to National Insurance over income tax, we upset mortgage payers because of the Liz Truss year... we upset young people with the idea of national service which we then dropped halfway through the campaign.

'We upset Remainers by being the party of Brexit in 2019. We upset Brexiteers this time around because we promised immigration would go down and it went up.'

Former chancellor George Osborne described the exit poll prediction as the party's 'Waterloo' as they are the 'worst results since 1832 when the Duke of Wellington was running the Tory party'. As polls closed last night, Mr Sunak thanked voters and Tory candidates, sharing an image of him waving to jubilant supporters at a rally in London on Tuesday.

Alongside the picture of the rally, where Mr Johnson also gave a stirring speech, Mr Sunak said: 'To the hundreds of Conservative candidates, thousands of volunteers and millions of voters: Thank you for your hard work, thank you for your support, and thank you for your vote.'

As speculation grew about his future last night, former minister Steve Baker said he thought Mr Sunak's mind 'will be set on what is right for the country'.

He added that it was likely there would be 'recriminations' during a 'grieving period' and that Mr Sunak would 'weigh extremely carefully' what he thinks is best for the country.

Senior Tory sources told the Mail that Mr Sunak would want to 'do his duty because that's what he's always done' – but they said it would depend on the 'scale' of the defeat.

Ex-Tory MP Sir John Redwood said he trusted Mr Sunak would 'carry on for an interim period'.

Charles Walker, who stood down at this election, said: 'It's going to be fiendishly difficult for us to come back from this position.

'It's not impossible, but the Conservative Party is going to have to show a level of discipline over the next six to eight months that it's not shown over the last four or five years.'

Abruptly quitting and forcing the party to choose an interim leader or triggering a hasty leadership race, is an unpopular prospect among many colleagues.

While it may be humiliating for Mr Sunak to endure Commons appearances from the opposition despatch box, allies fear the alternative – party infighting –would be worse.

'I think that Rishi's got to hang about – he's got a duty to the party to remain until a new leader is elected,' a former Cabinet minister told the Mail. The party is going to have a sort of nervous breakdown, that's what will happen – just as it did in 1997 – and it will take a while to pull out of that.

'The most important thing is that there shouldn't be any hasty action to put a new leader in place. It is essential that the voluntary party should have their full say. If they don't, the party will melt down completely.'

Even if the Tory leadership race does not officially begin immediately, Mr Sunak's potential successors will begin setting out their stalls today.

Earlier this week Suella Braverman – who held her Fareham and Waterlooville seat early this morning – urged the Conservative Party to 'read the writing on the wall' and 'prepare for the reality and frustration of opposition'.

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, she blamed the situation on a fracture within the party resulting from a rise in Nigel Farage's Reform UK. She added that this fact has been lost on colleagues who have 'driven our party's bus off the side of the cliff'.