Former education secretary Justine Greening has given the strongest signal yet she could run to be PM, just hours before the Chancellor delivers the budget.
Greening, who backed remain during the Brexit referendum in 2016, told Good Morning Britain that “things need to change” and refused to rule herself out as a candidate to replace embattled Theresa May.
The Putney MP has made social mobility central to her role as a backbencher after resigning from the cabinet in January when the PM asked her to switch role from education secretary to become work and pensions secretary.
In a blog for HuffPost highly critical of the government, Greening said Britain was “in the grip of a social mobility crisis”.
“Lack of social mobility is endemic,” she says. |“It’s no wonder there are many people in many communities who no longer feel they have a stake in this country.”
She adds: “The Conservative Party is nothing if it’s not the party of opportunity. But it’s now a staggering 31 years since we delivered our last landslide victory in 1987.”
It comes as speculation mounts that this could be the last budget delivered by Philip Hammond. Should the Government fail to secure a Brexit deal with the EU at crunch talks this autumn, May’s premiership could be vulnerable.
Greening told ITV: “I’m committed to doing whatever I can to make sure this country, for the first time, is a place where it doesn’t matter where you’re growing up, you get the same opportunities.
“And I think you have to have the same level of ambition on that as governments in the past have had on creating the welfare state, setting up the NHS.
“We need a guarantee on opportunity in this country.”
Told it sounded like a leadership bid, she went on: “Well things need to change don’t they? And people need to have some hope for the future.”
Asked if she would run, she replied: “I might be prepared to.
“But I’m more interested in the Conservative party showing actually what it can do for this country.”
Hammond is expected to reveal fresh cash to tackle the high street crisis, a £2bn boost for mental health services and money for tree-planting and roads.
However, he told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show on Sunday that, should Britain be faced with the prospect of crashing out of the EU without a deal, an emergency budget would be needed.