Rishi Sunak has become Britain’s new Prime Minister, replacing Liz Truss after her disastrous short spell in office. He automatically becomes the new occupant of Number 10 after being the only candidate to secure the backing of 100 MPs.
It completes a rise from relative obscurity just three years ago to realise his ambition of taking the top job.
You would have found few people outside Mr Sunak’s constituency who had heard of him in 2019 but the pandemic changed his fortunes dramatically.
He became a household name when, as a Chancellor still fresh in the job, he found himself responsible for delivering the furlough scheme, a Government cash giveaway on an unprecedented scale to ensure millions of people kept their jobs and businesses stayed afloat during the lockdowns. It boosted his public profile massively and made him favourite to replace Boris Johnson when his time in office was over.
A former banker, Mr Sunak was elected to Parliament in 2015. He was appointed Chief Secretary to the Treasury by Boris Johnson in July 2019 but was effectively brought in from nowhere to replace Sajid Javid as Chancellor, only a month before the Covid lockdown in February 2020.
But if he appeared nailed on to replace Mr Johnson at one point, it didn’t turn out to be that simple. A row over his wife’s tax affairs saw his star begin to fall before he was then caught up in the partygate scandal, receiving a fine for breaching Covid rules along with the Prime Minister.
It appeared at that point that his hopes of becoming PM were finished. But he remained popular among MPs and comfortably made it to the final two in the race to replace Mr Johnson.
But he did not have the backing of enough of the members, losing out to Liz Truss. At that point, he may have wondered if his chance at the top job had gone and if he even had a long-term future in frontline politics after being left out of Ms Truss’ cabinet.
But things turned around much quicker than anyone imagined. Ms Truss’ premiership unravelled rapidly following her calamitous mini-budget – something Mr Sunak had warned would create economic chaos during the leadership debates.
Her resignation opened the door for Mr Sunak once again. We’ll never know if Tory members would have snubbed him again in favour of Ms Mordaunt.