Rishi Sunak's former adviser joins plot to oust him

A former adviser to Rishi Sunak has joined a group of rebels plotting to oust the prime minister.

Will Dry, who worked in No. 10, is working with disenchanted MPs and political aides to help "draw up plans to remove Sunak from office", said The Times.

Dry, who said he had resigned after becoming "steadily more dispirited", helped to draw up questions for a recent YouGov poll of 14,000 people, commissioned by unnamed Conservative donors, which found that Labour is on course for a 1997-style landslide victory in the next election.

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The plot to replace the PM emerged earlier this week, when former cabinet minister Simon Clarke said the Tories face a "massacre" at the general election with Sunak at the helm.

But not all of Clarke's colleagues agreed with his verdict. The party WhatsApp group was "filled with invective", The Times said, as MPs called his intervention "profoundly self-defeating" and urged him to "get a f***ing grip", said the paper.

In the wake of the rebellion, a series of current and former ministers have "rallied round" Sunak, said The Telegraph. The former chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, said it would be "very unwise" to change leader now, while former defence secretary Ben Wallace warned that doing so would mean the "certain loss of power".

Clarke "likely hoped for a better response", said Bloomberg. Instead, the anger levelled at him "underscored the collective bind they are in". Time and numbers are "against the rebels", said The Times. Most believe they have only a three-month window to hit the 53 confidence letters needed to bring about a leadership contest. But "few in government think they will be able to do so".