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Boris Johnson refuses to step down amid ministerial exodus and soaring odds of early exit

Following the high profile resignations of Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak and Health Secretary Sajid Javid, five more junior ministers resigned at once early on Wednesday afternoon, in what appeared to be a coordinated attempt to inflict maximum pressure on Johnson.

Their letter of resignation said it had “become increasingly clear that the government cannot function given the issues that have come to light and the way in which they have been handled.”

As per reports, the prime minister has now lost more than 35 people from his government.

Gary Sambrook, a Tory MP on the executive of the 1922 Committee – which organizes confidence votes in the party leader – told Johnson in the House of Commons on Wednesday that he must “take responsibility and resign.”

Meanwhile rank-and-file Conservatives are reportedly preparing to meet to discuss a rule change that would allow another leadership challenge to Johnson, after the prime minister narrowly survived a confidence vote last month.

One Tory official said that the ministers “believe the situation is now untenable and they intend to tell the PM he must now resign”.

The ‘market’ is now pricing in a 95% chance that BoJo will leave office by the end of 2022. And worse still, there is a more than 70% chance that he will be gone by the end of August.

The outlook for the UK looks grim. Recession is a high probability. A cost-of-living crisis is upon us. Inflation is rampant and into double figures soon. The Bank of England has run out of policy tools and ideas. Workers are increasingly militant in their demands for pay rises. The national debt is 96% of GDP. The nations piggy bank feels empty, but Boris wants to spend his way back into popularity, even as the NHS, Defence and Education are all floundering.

“I am not going to step down and the last thing this country needs, frankly, is an election,” he told a parliamentary committee, when asked to confirm he would not seek to call an election rather than resign if he lost a vote of confidence.

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zerohedge.com
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