DOMINIC Raab has played down Conservative chances in the two byelections seen as the next flashpoint in Boris Johnson’s rolling leadership crisis.

But the deputy Prime Minister insisted any losses caused by “protest votes” in Wakefield and Tiverton & Honiton on June 23 would have little effect on a general election result.

Speaking on LBC Radio, Mr Raab said: “By-elections are often an opportunity for a protest vote in a way that a general election isn’t.

“Governments of the day often lose by-elections to go on to win them at a general election.

“But we’ll do everything we can to win both of those seats and support both of those great candidates up there.”

However critics of Mr Johnson, who failed to oust him in a 211-148 confidence vote of MPs on Monday, have warned the contests could be critical to the PM’s future. 

Both triggered by Tory MPs resigning in disgrace, the byelections are seen as tests of Mr Johnson’s popularity in the north and south of England, and measures of Labour and Liberal Democrat strength.

Wakefield, a red wall seat in West Yorkshire, had been Labour-held since 1932 until it was won for the Conservatives by Imran Ahmad Khan in 2019 with a majority of 3,358.

He resigned after being convicted in April of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy in 2008.

Polls suggest Labour now has a 20-point lead over the Tories in the seat, and will regain it with ease later this month. 

Tiverton & Honiton in Devon has been Tory-held since it was created in 1997, with Neil Parish holding it with a majority of 24,239 over Labour at the last general election.

However in April he announced he was resigning after looking at porn in the Commons chamber and in a committee and claiming he’d been searching for material on tractors. 

Despite coming third in 2019, the LibDems believe they can win the seat, helped by a tacit agreement with Labour that gives them a virtually clear run at it.

Mr Johnson today told his cabinet his win on Monday, despite 41 per cent of MPs wanting rid of him, would allow him to “draw a line” under recent distractions and move on.

However if the Tories lose both seats it will fuel worries in the party that Mr Johnson is no longer the electoral asset he was just three years ago, and a pincer movement by Labour in the north and the LibDems in the south could squeeze the party out of power in 2024.

Under the current rules of the backbench 1922 committee, Mr Johnson cannot face another confidence vote within 12 months.

However rebels have already highlighted that the rules could be changed to allow another vote far sooner, possibly before the Tory conference in the autumn.

Even if Mr Johnson gets through the byelections unscathed, he also faces an investigation by  the Commons privileges committee into whether he misled parliament over Partygate.

Despite attending a series of leaving dos for staff and the birthday party which led to him being fined by the police, Mr Johnson told MPs there had been no parties or law-breaking in Number 10 while strict pandemic lockdown rules were in force. 

Former Tory minister David Gauke said the committee, which is due to report in Ocotber, was the "the big issue" for the PM and could lead to a rule change on confidence votes.

"I really don’t believe even this Conservative Party will be able to tolerate someone who's been found to have misled the House of Commons," he said.

He said MPs will have to decide if they think the PM is still a vote-winner, and "the evidence is increasingly there that the British public have lost confidence in Boris Johnson".