Cabinet minister Gove joins Tory exodus before British election

LONDON – British Cabinet minister Michael Gove said he is standing down as a Member of Parliament, adding to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s struggles during the opening days of campaigning ahead of the July 4 general election.

While Mr Gove, 56, said he still supported Mr Sunak, he argued that the toll of being a politician meant it was time for “a new generation” to lead.

The key Brexit-backer joins a growing exodus of almost 80 Tories who have said they are quitting at the election, exceeding the departures ahead of Labour’s landslide victory in 1997.

His departure will heap scrutiny on Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt, who represents nearby South West Surrey and is facing a similar uphill re-election fight. 

Mr Gove’s decision comes at a critical time for Mr Sunak and the ruling Conservatives as they try to narrow the 20-point gap to Mr Keir Starmer’s opposition Labour Party.

Mr Sunak shocked Westminster by

calling a summer election

– he spent months indicating he would wait till autumn – but his campaign has got off to a stuttering start and drawn open criticism from across his party.

The steady stream of Conservative MPs opting to quit rather than fight the election is adding to the challenge.

There are few Tories bigger than Mr Gove, who has represented Surrey Heath, south-west of London, since 2005 and had a substantial 31 per cent majority when the seat was last contested in 2019. It is considered part of the so-called Blue Wall of safe Tory districts.

Yet, Mr Gove’s departure will still fuel the perception that the Tories’ slump in the opinion polls has put those areas at risk. Much of the Tory anger directed at Mr Sunak since he took over from Ms Liz Truss in October 2022 is driven by his failure to lift the party’s support.

Mr Sunak’s call for early polls has triggered fears that he is leading the party to one or more “Portillo” moments – when a Tory big beast loses a safe seat in an election whitewash – named after the time Cabinet minister Michael Portillo lost in Enfield Southgate in 1997.

As Westminster scours for likely candidates this time, much of the focus has fallen on Surrey, where the Tories are coming under pressure from the Liberal Democrats.

Mr Hunt, whose district will be divided up at the election under boundary changes to reflect population shifts, has said he will stand in the new Godalming and Ash constituency. He is widely thought to be at risk of what would be a high-profile defeat on election night.

Former deputy prime minister Dominic Raab also featured on most “Portillo” lists, but he had said a year ago he would step down.

“Conservative politicians are fleeing the blue wall in their droves,” Liberal Democrat spokeswoman Sarah Olney said after Mr Gove’s announcement.

“The drumbeat of Conservative MPs stepping down has been getting louder as the days go by – now it’s deafening.”

Mr Gove is one of the longest-serving and prominent Cabinet ministers of the last 14 years of Conservative governments. A close ally of Mr David Cameron and Mr George Osborne, he served in the former’s Cabinet as education secretary. 

Yet, he is more widely known for his role in Brexit.

Breaking from his friend, Mr Cameron, Mr Gove led the campaign to quit the European Union with Mr Boris Johnson. When the Leave side unexpectedly won the 2016 referendum, Mr Gove briefly ran Mr Johnson’s campaign to become Conservative leader and British prime minister. 

But in one of the most dramatic moments in an era of British politics that has had no shortage of them, Mr Gove famously turned against Mr Johnson before seeking the leadership himself.

In the end, it was Ms Theresa May who became leader, triggering years of wrangling by the Tories over how to implement Brexit. 

Former Cabinet minister Andrea Leadsom, best known for challenging Ms May in 2016, also said late on May 24 that she would

step down

.  

Beyond Brexit, Mr Gove is known as a politician who – often controversially – drove through major changes in the departments he ran. As education secretary, he fell out with teachers over changes to exams and targets.

Most recently, Mr Gove has had responsibility for housing and levelling up in Mr Sunak’s Cabinet.

But in recent months he has struggled to win Cabinet approval for his plans to bolster leaseholders’ rights, while his Renters’ Reform Bill to ban “no-fault evictions” was dropped from the final list of legislation the government will try to push through Parliament before the election. BLOOMBERG