Boris Johnson says colleagues able to 'draw a line' under issues following confidence vote

He has promised to cut taxes and drive down Government spending in an effort to bring wavering MPs on side after 148 members of his own backbenches said they did not have confidence in his leadership.

It came as one senior rebel suggested that rules governing the committee of backbench Conservative MPs are under consideration for alteration that would allow another confidence in Mr Johnson within a year.

Opening a Cabinet meeting in Downing Street yesterday morning Mr Johnson said: “We are able now to draw a line under the issues that our opponents want to talk about.”

But he asked Ministers to “make sure that you’re thinking the whole time about cutting the costs of government, about cutting the costs that business has to face, and, of course, cutting the costs that everybody else faces, families up and down the country”.

Reforms to regulations could help cut costs in areas such as energy, transport or housing, Mr Johnson said, telling Ministers “there is ample scope for us to get out of people’s way and to do things better”.

He told Ministers: “Over the course of the next few weeks, I’m going to ask everybody to come forward with ways in which we cut costs, drive reform, and make sure that we understand that in the end it is people who have the best feel for how to spend their own money rather than the government or the state. And that is our fundamental, Conservative instinct.”

One Yorkshire MP who voted against the Prime Minister said that colleagues should “accept the result” after Mr Johnson “won the vote fair and square”.

Philip Davies, who represents Shipley, told Times Radio: “We’ve now got a duty to get behind him and actually bring the party together to help us reconnect with the British people.”

Mr Davies added: “It is no secret that I have been very critical of some of the Government’s policies, particularly the high-tax, high-spend and restricting people’s freedoms.

“That was certainly a factor in my vote.”

Senior MP Tobias Ellwood shared Mr Davies’ view in supporting the outcome of the vote, but said he would support the 1922 system being adjusted “to mean the current rule of allowing a

Prime Minister an entire year would be changed”. He told Sky News:” ”I understand that’s what the 1922 Committee are looking at, deliberately for this reason.” Current rules stipulate that a leader cannot face a second confidence vote for a year after winning.