THE field of candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party narrows today as Alan Duncan withdraws with a swipe at the old-fashioned “Tory Taleban” he believes could “condemn the party to oblivion”.

Mr Duncan admits that he has failed to garner much support from MPs but gives warning that his party were communications amateurs and had to root out the “moralising wing”.

The Shadow Transport Secretary, who was the only openly gay candidate, offered ideas for improving the party’s prospects, including a new series of not-for-profit organisations to revitalise public services.

His withdrawal comes as David Cameron, the Shadow Education Secretary and leadership contender, is to call for more state assistance for “social entrepreneurs”. In a speech today, he will also argue for more flexibility for the unemployed to become volunteers without losing their benefits.

Mr Duncan said: “Our Achilles’ heel has been our social attitude. Censorious judgmentalism from the moralising wing, which treats half our own countrymen as enemies, must be rooted out.

“We should take J. S. Mill as our lodestar, and allow people to live as they choose until they actually harm someone. If the Tory Taleban can’t get that, they’ll condemn us all to oblivion.”

Mr Duncan lists a series of Tory failings, including deficiencies in education and overseas policies which could be seen as attacks on Mr Cameron and Liam Fox, the Shadow Foreign Secretary. He says: “We must turn our indignation at poor education into a fundamental review that asks what we should teach and how we should teach it. Why too are we talking so little of foreign affairs and social cohesion at a time when it is shaming for us not to have a single Muslim MP?”

Mr Duncan refuses to be drawn on whom he will support for leader when the contest proper is called in October.

David Davis, the Shadow Home Secretary, yesterday predicted he would get “very solid support” from fellow MPs. He shrugged off reports that the former leader William Hague would endorse the rival rightwinger Liam Fox. He said: “The important thing is to get very solid support in the parliamentary party and solid support in the country, and I think I will be able to do that.”

Dr Fox rejected suggestions that Mr Davis was too far ahead in the leadership stakes to be caught. He said: “I don’t think it’s down to stopping anyone. Candidates should stand for what they believe in.”

The party looks set to put the decision on a new leader into the hands of Tory MPs rather than members, but Dr Fox said that he was still pushing for a mixed system.

He said: “The Labour Party has an electoral college. It seems to work quite well for them and they can even include the trade unions in that.”

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