Jeremy Hunt and Nadhim Zahawi have been knocked out of the contest to become the next Conservative Party leader and Prime Minister.

Six MPs remain in the race to go through to the next stage of voting.

Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt and Liz Truss got the highest number of votes in the contest.

Kemi Badenoch, Tom Tugendhat and Suella Braverman are also still in the race having reached the threshold of 30 votes.

Hunt, the former health secretary, got the least, scoring 18 votes, while Zahawi, appointed chancellor by Boris Johnson the day before he was forced to resign as Prime Minister, got 25 votes, five short of the threshold.

Sunak, Mordaunt and Truss are emerging as the frontrunners in the race to get to the last two who go through to the final round where all Conservative Party members vote.

Mordaunt officially launched her campaign earlier in the day by telling colleagues she is their "best shot" at winning the next election.

Mordaunt, the trade minister, said: "I'm the candidate that Labour fear the most, and they're right to.”

Mordaunt emerged as one of the frontrunners in the campaign as Conservative MPs moved to the first round of voting.

Mordaunt insisted she is "very different" from Johnson but indicated she would not call an early General Election to win her own mandate if she entered No 10.

The former defence secretary pledged to return to traditional Conservative values of "low tax, small state and personal responsibility".