Tory MP who held seat in shock result hints he may run to replace Rishi Sunak as party leader

By Noah Vickers, Local Democracy Reporter

A Tory MP who held his seat in a shock result has hinted that he may run to replace Rishi Sunak as leader of his party.

According to the BBC’s exit poll, policing minister Chris Philp had only a one per cent chance of holding his constituency of Croydon South.

But in a huge upset for Labour, Mr Philp held the seat by a majority of 2,313 votes, down from 12,339 at the last election.

Asked whether he will run for the Conservative leadership, he said: “I haven’t even thought about that yet, let’s just see how the dust settles. But who knows?

“Nationally, I’ll be concentrating on holding the incoming Government to account and making the case for lower taxes and a regulatory environment that lets businesses prosper and thrive, to let people keep more of their own money.

“Those are the kind of things which I’ll be working for in Parliament.”

His constituency, which has only ever elected Tories since its creation in 1974, had been heavily targeted by Labour. In a sign of how worried the Conservatives were about losing it, Rishi Sunak had made a campaign visit on Tuesday.

The re-elected MP said: “All of the MRP polls, and the exit poll, said that we would lose Croydon South.

“We have bucked the trend – the result here was a lot better than many other places around the country.”

He said he wanted to bring a new swimming pool to Purley, a new medical centre and banking hub to Coulsdon, and to get more police deployed in Croydon town centre to boost safety.

Responding to the results nationally, Mr Philp said: “Fourteen years in power is quite a long time. I think there were frustrations on issues like tax, issues like immigration.

“All of those I think weighed on voters’ minds, and I think we need to take that on board and respond to it.”

Looking to the borough’s other constituencies, the Labour MP Steve Reed was re-elected in his re-drawn Streatham and Croydon North seat, and is now set to become Environment Secretary.

Sarah Jones, re-elected in the new constituency of Croydon West, is expected to become Minister for Industry and Decarbonisation.

In Croydon East, former Merton councillor Natasha Irons was elected for Labour. She told supporters that the party’s landslide victory was an opportunity it “must not squander”.

The result in Croydon South was:

Conservative hold.

Rob Bromley (Reform) 4,149

Elaine Garrod (Green) 2,859

Richard Howard (Lib Dem) 4,384

Kulsum Hussin (Workers Party) 612

Chris Philp (Conservative) 19,757

Mark Samuel (Independent) 173

Ben Taylor (Labour) 17,444

Pictured top: Chris Philp MP hints he may run for Tory leadership (Picture: Noah Vickers)