The vote for the next prime minister was delayed after GCHQ, the government’s communications headquarters, warned that hackers could simply adjust people’s ballots.
Correspondence from the Conservative Party was sent to members about the situation, as noted via Sky News.
The original story was reported through the Telegraph newspaper, which said the Conservative Party had been forced to abandon plans to allow members to replace their vote with the next leader later in the festival due to concerns.
The challenge means mail-in ballots have still been cast to Conservative Party members when they were due to be sent from Monday.
The newspaper says members were warned that their mail-in ballots could arrive as early as Aug. 11.
The resolution was made on the recommendation of the National Cyber Security Centre, which is a component of GCHQ’s uk listening station.
By Jon Craig, Chief Political Correspondent
After a day in which Liz Truss’s Conservative leadership crusade was defeated due to her regional pay blunder, it’s suddenly Rishi Sunak who is on the ropes, according to a shocking new poll.
What’s unexpected is the huge advantage that youGov’s ballot suggests Ms. Truss now has over Mr. Sunak, but the claim that nearly nine out of 10 Conservative members have already made up their minds.
At 26%, the former chancellor’s point is bleak and the 60% planned for the foreign minister will calm nerves in her field after her embarrassed public sector took a radical turn.
Although it’s a ballot and opinion ballots are a snapshot, YouGov’s findings suggest that Ms Truss could be headed towards a victory as decisive as Boris Johnson’s over Jeremy Hunt in 2019.
Johnson then won 66. 4% of the vote from party members and Hunt 33. 6%, a margin he won only about 33%, to the 34-point lead YouGov is now giving Truss over Sunak.
The YouGov ballot also suggests that only 14% of party members are unsure or say they will vote and fiercely contradicts an earlier personal ballot suggesting the gap had narrowed to just five points.
YouGov’s last vote before this one took place after five rounds of MPs voting, when Penny Mordaunt eliminated and advised a 24-point lead for Ms Truss over Mr Sunak, from 62% to 38%.
The evident widening of the gap, in the week when party members get their votes, will delight Truss’s supporters and, no doubt, those of the ousted Boris Johnson who need to see Sunak crushed.
But he risks plunging Sunak’s camp into sadness, panic and depression, and making his team worry about the former chancellor playing the game, even before most Conservative members have voted.
Liz Truss has extended her lead over Rishi Sunak to 34 points in the Conservative leadership race, according to a new YouGov poll for The Times newspaper.
The poll also indicates that 60% of members now say they will vote for the foreign secretary to succeed Boris Johnson as prime minister.
This is only 26% for former Foreign Minister Mr Sunak.
The ballot that Ms. Truss is now ahead of Mr. Sunak in all age groups, in other parts of the country and between men and women.
The category in which she beats Ms. Truss is among Tory Remain supporters.
The poll also found that nearly nine out of ten Conservative MPs already know how they will vote before the poll ends this week.
But the two potential long-term leaders will fear that more than 50% of Conservative Party members would be elected to succeed Mr Johnson and lose the party’s majority in the next election.
Only 19% of members think Mr Sunak can lead the Conservatives to victory, while 39% think Ms Truss can accept Labour’s challenge.
Tees Valley Conservative Mayor Ben Houchen said Liz Truss’s plan to update national wage agreements for public sector staff with regional arrangements could see the party lead the next general election.
Houchen, who supports Rishi Sunak in the leadership election, told TalkTV: “Basically, this is a far-fetched policy and has now been achieved through the campaign, which is why they have pulled out.
“I have a lot of time for Liz, as I have a lot of time for Rishi.
“So, I’m just pitching some stupid concepts that are hurting the Conservative Party and that would probably charge us for the next general election. “
Elsewhere in politics, the SNP has officially submitted a request to interfere in a case that could allow the Scottish Parliament to legislate for a referendum on independence.
In a 15-page filing with the court, lawyers Claire Mitchell QC and David Welsh argue that it would be “fair, equitable and reasonable” to allow the SNP to interfere in the process.
Last month, the Lord Advocate asked the Supreme Court to make a decision on whether an imagined bill that would legislate for some other referendum would be within Holyrood’s powers.
The court said it would hear oral arguments from both sides on Oct. 11 and 12, and now the SNP also requested the opportunity to present its arguments to vote.
The Daily Mail has announced that it will back Liz Truss to be the next minister and leader of the Conservative Party.
An article in the Daily Mail Plus says: “Both candidates would circle Around Starmer.
“But we think the foreign minister is the user to lead the conservatives . . . and the country. “
This comes after The Telegraph also the foreign minister on Monday.
A Conservative MP who supports Liz Truss in the leadership crusade said of the drama of the last 24 hours: “It’s crazier than a U-turn.
“We’re going to go ahead and be informed of the bug. “
Liz Truss continues to face backlash after this afternoon’s reversal of her public sector reimbursement proposal.
A source close to her leadership rival Rishi Sunak’s crusade said: “It wasn’t a mistake, Liz sought this out in 2018 as cST (Chief Secretary of the Treasury).
“He’s to turn. “
“The girl is not made to convert,” an expression used by former Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in her speech at the Conservative Party convention on October 10, 1980.
It was noted as a defining discourse in Thatcher’s political development, fitting into a kind of Thatcherite motto.
Ms Truss was accused of imitating Ms Thatcher in the leadership campaign.
Twitter commentators appear to recreate an outfit worn by Margaret Thatcher for her appearance in the first debate on Conservative leadership.
The foreign secretary wore a black blazer and a white blouse with a giant bow for the event, matching precisely what the former conservative minister wore in a 1979 election broadcast.
But Ms Truss denied taking Ms Thatcher as a model, such comparisons were “frustrating”.
“I am my person,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
Earlier that day, aspiring leader Liz Truss gave up on her decision to cut wages in the public sector.
He said the proposal had been “distorted” but added that he would not move forward with the regional salary commission scheme to pay staff in regions less than those working in London and the south-east.
Speaking to the BBC’s local television channel in Dorset this afternoon, Ms Truss doubled down on her previous comments.
“I am concerned that my policy on this has been distorted. I never intended to replace the terms of use for nurses and nurses,” she said.
“But what I need to be transparent is that I’m going to go ahead with the regional repayment commissions, it’s no longer my policy. “
Liz Truss’s change of heart in cutting the civil service proved to backfire on her leadership campaign.
After pledging £11 billion in pay cuts in a “war on Whitehall waste”, the prospect of public sector pay cuts in outdoor spaces in London and the south-east has sparked strong complaints from prominent Red Wall Conservatives, such as the mayor of Tees Valley. , Ben Houchen.
Considered the candidate of conservative Red Wall voters, Truss has now become vulnerable to accusations of leveling the country and ignoring northern communities, as his shiny new policy announced last night has been described as deaf.
A 2019 Red Wall MP who publicly supported Liz Truss told me that her quick replacement from the centre was “good policy”.
But is it possible that this deserted policy already undermines theirs by the Red Wall?
Such reversals give a bad symbol of a future minister, as they recommend a lack of discernment when it comes to policymaking.
Despite the complaints of Rishi Sunak’s crusade team, Sunak also has no flaws when it comes to changes of direction.
The former foreign minister promised a reduction in the VAT on fuels after worrying in the past about the rest of the tax
Conservative members will begin voting this week in the same election, but with any of the candidates accused of embarrassing U-turns, they may not have yet been decided.