MICHAEL GOVE HAS been eliminated from the race to replace Theresa May at 10 Downing Street meaning Boris Johnson and Jeremy Hunt will go head-to-head for the role.
Gove, who is the current Environment Secretary received 75 votes from Conservative MPs, the lowest of all three candidates and so was knocked out of the race.
Boris Johnson received 160 votes, while Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt received 77 votes from the 313 MPs who cast a vote in the fourth round of ballots this afternoon.
The Conservative leadership vote will now open up to all party members, not just MPs, and the winner of the contest will be announced on the week of 22 July.
Earlier today, MPs cast a vote in the third round of ballots which saw Home Secretary Sajid Javid eliminated.
Now that the candidates have been whittled down to two, out of a total 10 who put themselves forward, a vote will be opened to all members of the Conservative party.
Johnson topped the vote from the outset and slowly harnessed votes that otherwise would have gone to other candidates before they were eliminated.
In the first round of voting Johnson secured 114 votes, marginally increasing to 126 votes in the second round, before jumping to 143 votes in round three.
In the fourth round of voting earlier today he managed to secure 157 votes – half of the available votes from MPs.
Both Johnson and Hunt have said they would sacrifice a deal with Europe if the EU does not reopen negotiations of the withdrawal agreement.
Earlier today, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said reopening the deal would not be entertained by Europe, where some member states felt an “enormous hostility” to the prospect of any further requests to an extension of Brexit negotiations.
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