Sacked minister Harriett Baldwin to run for Treasury committee chair

Parliamentary Under Secretary of Station and Minister of Defence Procurement, Harriett Baldwin, arrives for the UN Peacekeeping Defence Ministerial meetings at Lancaster House in London on September 8, 2016. The meeting follows the Leaders Summit on Peacekeeping in September 2015. / AFP / DANIEL LEAL-OLIVAS (Photo credit should read DANIEL LEAL-OLIVAS/AFP/Getty Images)

Sacked Foreign Office minister Harriett Baldwin will run for the vacant chairmanship of the Treasury select committee, the New Statesman has learned.

Conservative sources said Baldwin, a prominent Jeremy Hunt supporter who was dismissed as Africa minister on Thursday, will be a candidate in the election to replace Nicky Morgan, who was promoted to cabinet as Culture Secretary last week. The former Treasury minister is understood to have told colleagues of her intention to enter what is likely to prove a crowded field.

A May loyalist who backed Remain in 2016, Baldwin voted for the withdrawal agreement at every time of asking and has repeatedly stressed her preference for leaving with the EU with a deal.She served as George Osborne’s City minister from 2015 to 2016 and was an investment banker before entering parliament.

The West Worcestershire MP is the second confirmed candidate for chair. Former Brexit minister and Eurosceptic rebel Steve Baker, another member of the 2010 intake who worked in financial services before becoming an MP, declared he would run yesterday.

Having studiously avoided the sort of controversy other Remainer ministers revelled in causing in the dying months of Theresa May’s premiership, Baldwin’s immediate challenge will be to build her profile among Labour MPs – the crucial swing electorate – over the summer.