Conservative Party leadership - live: Sunak and Truss in Birmingham as contest reaches final stages

Tom Tugendhat has been knocked out of the Tory leadership contest after the third round of voting.

Conservative MPs cast their vote once again to choose the next leader of the party and the next Prime Minister as they attempt to whittle the candidates down to just two.

Four candidates remain in the contest, with Rishi Sunak once again gaining the highest number of votes from the parlimentary party at 115.

Penny Mordaunt has become a favourite with the bookies to win the contest but her support in the third round, the MP actually saw her support shrink by one vote to 82.

Liz Truss and Kemi Badenoch gained support in this round, adding seven and nine votes to their totals repsectively.

Third round ballot results

The candidates in the leadership race are expected to find out who has made it to the next stage in less than two hours.

Results of the latest round of voting are expected to be announced at 8pm.

The lowest-placed contender will be eliminated from the contest.

Penny Mordaunt said she was taking nothing for granted as she arrived for a behind-closed-doors 1922 Committee hustings in Parliament.

Asked if she was confident she said: “We’ll see. You can never take anything for granted.”

Ms Mordaunt has come second in the first two rounds of voting.

When asked how the hustings went, she told reporters: “All very good, all very jolly.”

Sir Keir Starmer has said he was “astonished” by Tory leadership candidates withdrawing from a televised debate, saying it demonstrated a lack of “confidence”.

He added: “Pulling out of a TV debate when you want to be prime minister doesn’t show very much confidence”.

Deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner said:

The Tory leadership debate on Sky News planned for Tuesday night has been cancelled after Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss indicated they did not want to take part, the broadcaster said.

Penny Mordaunt has defended her views on gender identity after fellow candidates criticised her position.

Suella Braverman, who dropped out in round two, was openly critical of her views.

Ms Mordaunt clarified that while she respected the status of trans women, she recognised that trans women are not the same as biological women.

Liz Truss and Kemi Badenoch questioned Mr Mordaunt’s previous work as an equalities minister which saw plans drawn up for self-ID schemes, with Ms Badenoch pointing the finger at Ms Mordaunt for the policy being tabled.

The debate kicked off with a line of questioning on the erosion of trust in politics following the scandals that hit the end of Boris Johnson’s premiership.

While the candidates attempted to convince the audience why they were trustworthy, the most noteworthy moment of the round came when presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy asked if Boris Johnson was an honest person.

While Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt and Liz Truss skirted around giving a solid answer to the question, Kemi Badenoch replied “sometimes”.

However, Tom Tugendhat seperated himself from the group by plainly replying: “No.”

The first live TV debate has kicked off for our remaining candidates.

Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt, Kemi Badenoch, Tom Tugendhat and Liz Truss are currently appearing on Channel 4, where they face questions from floating voters on key issues such as trust in politics, taxation plans and the cost of living crisis.