Sources say former chancellor Philip Hammond is keen to set up a grassroots group

Philip Hammond has vowed to create a “Tory Momentum” campaign, sparking claims that he is threatening to unleash it on his old party unless he is brought back into the Conservative fold.

The former chancellor was stripped of the whip for opposing Boris Johnson’s Brexit plans in September and is still threatening to run as an independent candidate in his Runnymede and Weybridge constituency in the general election.

Tory sources say that Hammond signalled in conversations with Johnson’s aides that he would stand aside if he was given the whip back so he could retire as a Conservative MP.

They also claim he intimated that he would like a peerage and wants to set up a grassroots lobbying group of young business leaders to