Veterans’ Minister Johnny Mercer, has called some of his fellow Conservative MPs ‘delusional about their own abilities’ and has said there is only ‘three or four serious candidates’ to replace Boris Johnson as Prime Minister.

Speaking to TalkTV’s The News Desk, Mercer called MPs pressuring Johnson to stand down immediately as ‘churlish’ and said that the Prime Minister should be allowed to leave No. 10 ‘with the degree of dignity I think he deserves.’

Mercer also told TalkTV he would only support a leadership candidate who backed his plans to make the UK 'the best country in the world to be a veteran' and described the emotion after Boris Johnson made his resignation speech in Downing Street.