Rishi Sunak will become prime minister today after a meeting with King Charles III.
Today, the former chancellor will make a statement outside No 10 at about 10.15a.m before travelling to Buckingham Palace.
At the palace, the King will host an audience with the new Tory leader – who is the third PM in less than two months – during which he will be invited to form a new government.
He is also the second PM since the monarch was crowned following his mother Queen Elizabeth II’s death in September.
After the meeting, Sunak will then return to Downing Street where he will make another speech at about 11.35a.m.
Earlier this morning, his predecessor Liz Truss – who was in office for just 44 days – will be chairing a cabinet meeting at about 9a.m.
She will then go to Buckingham Palace to offer her resignation to the King before making a statement outside No 10 at 10.15a.m.
It was officially announced that Sunak had won the Tory leadership contest on Monday afternoon, while the King was reportedly travelling to London, as he had previously planned, from the private royal estate of Sandringham.
Sunak, 42, who was born in Southampton and is of Indian heritage, will become the country’s first non-white prime minister and the youngest one in more than 200 years.
He was promoted to the role – without a usual vote by Conservative Party members – after a leadership contest against former PM Boris Johnson, and House of Commons leader Penny Mordaunt.
Truss’s predecessor Johnson never formally declared his candidacy and was evasive about whether he received endorsements from at least 100 Tory MPs. Mordaunt dropped out of the race.
Sunak, who served as chancellor in Johnson’s government – most notably during the COVID pandemic – was the only candidate to receive more than 100 nominations.
Calls for a general election have been growing, with even Tory MPs such as Nadine Dorries, Zac Goldsmith, and Sir Christopher Hope – supporters of Johnson – joining in with demands that the nation goes to the polls.
Sir Christopher said a general election should be called earlier than 2024, arguing it is the only solution for the next leader now the Conservative Party is “ungovernable”.
The MP for Christchurch in Dorset, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “The best way they can get that respect is by winning a mandate with the people, and that’s why I think a general election is essentially the only answer, otherwise we’re just going to go from bad to worse.
“The party is ungovernable in the House of Commons and so we’re going to have continuing rebellions as we try to change policies and so on, and so I must say I’m very pessimistic, I’m very angry, and I feel that Boris has been let down once again and undermined by our parliamentary colleagues.”
