A top Tory tipped to be in the frame to take over from party leader Rishi Sunak has retained his Kent seat.

Tom Tugendhat, believed by some as a potential challenger in any future Conservative leadership election, was re-elected to serve Tonbridge once more.

The Tory minister secured 20,517 votes, defeating his nearest rivals; the Labour Party’s Lewis Bailey on 9,351, and the Green’s Anna Cope on 7,596. Full results below.

Speaking after the result, Mr Tugendhat expressed how “very grateful” he is to continue to work for the people of Tonbridge, but also addressed the landslide victory from Labour.

“This has been a very, very difficult night for the Conservative Party,” he said.

“This has clearly been one of those moments where we really do need to stop and rethink where we're going.

“This is a moment where we have failed to deliver and sadly, quite obviously, we've lost the trust and confidence of the British public and that's a really big wake-up moment.

“What we need to be doing now is looking again at how we serve the British people.

“Clearly we have a responsibility immediately which is to hold Sir Keir Starmer's administration to account.

“They've got an extraordinary majority of a very, very narrow mandate and it's our responsibility to scrutinise the ideas that they are now going to be trying to put in place having failed to explain them to the British people in advance.”

The count took place at The Angel Centre where a turnout of 69.34% (50,478) – a slight drop compared to 71.9% for 2019, was recorded.

As of 3.30am, doubtful votes were being discussed.

A number of them had large crosses through, with notes of “none of the above”.

Others had smiley faces and one looked to have an image of satirical candidate Count Binface stuck onto the ballot paper.

The total number of spoilt votes came to 150.

But ultimately the result here was never in doubt with Mr Tugendhat securing a 11,116 majority.

KentOnline had been told earlier in the evening Green Party candidate Anna Cope, who finished third, was unwell.

Speaking on her behalf, count agent Jeremy Webb said: “It’s been quite busy here since the boxes have started arriving at about 10.15pm.

“I think the Green Party have done well in Tonbridge – we are probably in second place with Labour, it’s very close.

“Outside of the town I think perhaps Labour are a little bit ahead.

“How it all adds up we will find out at about 5am.”

In 2019, Tom Tugendhat received more than 64.2% of the votes and took the seat with the biggest ever majority of 26,941. That’s now been reduced to 11,166.

The 51-year-old was appointed Minister for Security in September 2022 and put in a bid to become the party’s new leader after Boris Johnson.

However, he was eliminated in the third round of voting.

Only two people have sat in Parliament representing Tonbridge in the past 50 years: Sir John Stanley (1974-2015) and Tom Tugendhat (2015 onwards).