The Tory Party’s ‘men in grey suits’ practised their aim — and their shots rang out across the sky. As the clay pigeons flew overhead and the marksmen pulled their triggers, the setting could hardly have been more glorious at society gunmaker Holland & Holland’s 60-acre ‘Shooting Grounds’ in Hertfordshire.
Yet the MPs wielding the shotguns two weeks ago had another quarry in mind: the Prime Minister himself.
Ostensibly, the event had been organised by the ‘All Party Parliamentary Group on Shooting and Conservation’. There are just five members of this group — only one of whom was actually there, chairman Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, a longstanding critic of the Prime Minister.
Also present, unusually, were five key members of the Tory Party’s 13-strong 1922 Committee executive — and they had much to discuss.
The plotters intended to trigger a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister at the 1922 Committee - chaired by Sir Graham Brady
They had hoped that their genial assembly might remain off the media’s radar, and had been sure to arrange it far from the prying eyes of the Commons and key Boris loyalists.
But the plotters were unlucky for two reasons. First: I have spoken to someone with knowledge of the event, who was only too keen to tell me what took place.
And second: Boris, too, got wind of this very modern gunpowder plot — and foiled it just in time.
One well-placed source tells me: ‘The MPs made their own way to the clay pigeon shoot: much more discreet. Everyone left separately at the end of the afternoon as well, and went back to their constituencies.
‘By claiming they were there to talk about shooting and conservation, they gave themselves a sliver of respectability. But the only shooting they actually discussed was the Prime Minister’s.’
They had met to discuss one question: should the Conservative Party’s rules be changed to allow an incumbent leader to be challenged twice in a single year?
The plotters knew that the PM would likely survive any immediate no-confidence vote. After all, he won a thumping election victory not so long ago and the country still credits him for the successful vaccine roll-out.
Another MP brandishing a gun — though not, I’m afraid, very well — was Nusrat Ghani, who claimed at the weekend that she was sacked from the Government two years ago amid concerns about her ‘Muslimness’
But later this year, if his enemies felt they could and should topple him — what then?
‘The talk at the shoot was all about a second leadership vote against Boris within a year,’ says my source. ‘There’s a lot of hostility to the PM on the 1922 executive. Frankly, it’s sickening to behold . . .
‘There was discussion about who would be first to stand up to call for Boris’s resignation if Sue Gray’s report is bad.’
The source adds archly: ‘There is a terrible irony about Tory MPs plotting the demise of their leader at a famous shooting range just up the road from his constituency [in Uxbridge].’
The key figure on the day was Sir Geoffrey himself, who made his views clear in December when he said that unless the PM’s performance improved, ‘some members of the party will be thinking we have got to have a change’.
Also present was 1922 Committee chairman Sir Graham Brady. He is the one to whom Tory MPs write confidentially if they want to trigger a vote of no-confidence. (When the threshold of 54 letters — or 15 per cent of Tory MPs — is passed, the vote moves to the parliamentary party.)
Another MP brandishing a gun — though not, I’m afraid, very well — was Nusrat Ghani, who claimed at the weekend that she was sacked from the Government two years ago
