As Nick Wood, former press secretary to Conservative leaders William Hague and Iain Duncan Smith, explained: “The Right does not have a preferred candidate, so it has to make an assessment of each hopeful’s ideological points as well as judging their chances of winning. “These contests are really very simple and the Tories have been fighting them since the beginning of time. It’s about Left versus Right, but determining where people sit on that spectrum can be quite difficult.” Mr Wood, who has advised many of the candidates over the years, believes it will ultimately end up being a two-horse race between Mr Sunak and Ms Truss. “Left and Right are probably not the only terms that sum up the struggle,” he added. “More nuanced are the labels of Tory establishment versus Tory radicals, but in the end it comes down to pretty much the same thing. “I expected Hunt, Tugendhat and Javid to come out soon for Sunak, cementing his position as the man to beat. “On the Right, Truss – with 13 declared supporters as of today – is doing most of the running. She has embraced Brexit with all the zeal of a proselytizer and is a regular speaker at the Institute of Economic Affairs, the one think tank dedicated to low taxes, light regulation and shrinking the size of the sprawling modern state.”
