As another Conservative prime minister is forced out of a job over the issue of Europe, an issue that has vexed Tory leaders since the country became a member in the early Seventies, the question inevitably turns to the issue of who will pick up the mantle.

It is somewhat surprising that the choice of candidates is as wide as the grand national given the job is surely a poisoned chalice. A nation divided, a party on the brink of implosion and a world looking in and wondering where Britain goes from here may perversely turn out to be the ideal conditions for an incoming leader who has the talent and foresight to steer the country skilfully to the promised land. Not since Suez has Britain faced an existential threat as potentially catastrophic as Brexit, but what sort of leader will it take to pull the country back from the brink?

The reservoir of trust for British politicians is at an all-time low. Any leader brave or foolish enough to step into the fray must have a grasp of the issues that have dumfounded politicians for the last three years, an aptitude for dealing with complex problems and yet manage to appeal to both sides of a bitterly divided country. In fact, he or she must do more. They must heal the country and restore trust. They must rehabilitate our reputation with the outside world and return order to our politics. It is a tall order indeed. The popular answer to the question of who should lead the country next predictably seems to be Boris Johnson, but does he have what it takes? If not, who does?

Last month, Rory Stewart – who was promoted to minister for international development after the fall of Gavin Williamson – was the first cabinet member to put his head above the parapet and speak openly about his desire to become prime minister. An old Etonian, Rory Stewart may appear to be like any other establishment candidate (after all, a great many Conservative prime minister have been drawn from the same stock), but he is different and his CV is impressive. In fact, it is a wonder why the country do not scrutinise what their leaders achieved before entering politics in the same way employers do.

Low profile, reflective and moderate in his political views, Rory Stewart may be the dark horse the country needs. His experiences before entering politics make him close to an enlightened choice for a country desperate for stability and in need of self-respect. A former tutor to Princes William and Harry, Rory Stewart began his career in the Foreign Office. He was posted to Indonesia where he was tasked with handling difficult relations between Indonesia and East Timor following a United Nations sponsored referendum in 1999 that saw East Timor choose independence.

Before being despatched to Iraq to take charge of two provinces in 2002, he travelled through Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, walking 6,000 miles in a bid to understand ordinary local people whose lives had been ravaged by the chaos of war and religious conflict. He stayed in 500 different village homes across his travels and his experiences taught him a valuable lesson in the perils of intervening in countries we know little about. He once said, “In the end, the basic problem is very, very simple. Why don’t these interventions work? Because we are foreigners. If things are going wrong in a country, it’s not usually that we don’t have enough foreigners. It’s usually that we have too many.”

In Iraq, he helped write the country’s new constitution and wrote two best-selling memoirs about his experiences. In 2004, he was appointed a professor at Harvard University and taught classes on human rights and is often called upon to advise policy makers on the tricky issue of Afghanistan. He is a talented polyglot and speaks several languages including Dari, a dialect of Persian spoken in Afghanistan. At the request of the Prince Of Wales, he used the benefit of his experiences in the region to found a charity in Afghanistan. While at Harvard, it was reported that Brad Pitt’s production company had bought the rights to make a film about Stewart’s life, so remarkable were his experiences and achievements. There is no doubt Stewart’s experiences before entering Westminster read like a training manual for a first-class leader. He has form and he is capable. His experiences make him wise beyond his years but there is also a boyish charm about him, making him look credible and engaging when he speaks. In 2015, he won the award for the best parliamentary speech on the topic of hedgehogs.

He is a remainer at heart and speaks with all the honesty of the fertile plains of the Hindu Kush. He has supported Theresa May’s deal consistently and recognises that the concerns of 16 million people who voted to remain in the EU should be respected. Tellingly, he also recognises that the referendum result was about concerns over immigration and the economy and those issues must be at the centre of any deal finally achieved. He asks of himself deeply searching questions about the state of our country. After four years of being in Westminster (he was elected MP for Penrith And The Border in 2010), he contemplated the state of democracy in Britain: “I think British democracy at the moment is really struggling to work... You have to ask yourself what a country that was the first to industrialise, and the first to de-industrialise, does with itself. What is our civilisation? What is our democracy? Who do we want to be?”

By concerning himself with such questions, Stewart stands out from the crowd. He is a moderniser by instinct and has been behind a number of popular initiatives. In 2011, he led the first backbench motion to extend broadband and mobile coverage calling for the mobile phone companies to be forced to provide coverage to 98 per cent of the population. As environment minister he introduced the successful plastic bag tax and proved himself adept at dealing with the logistical problem of flooding in rural areas, putting rapid military deployment effectively at the centre of government emergency planning. As minister for prisons he recruited an extra 2,500 prison officers months ahead of schedule and extolled the virtues of assisting prisoners to use their time to reform. He once mused that he would like to reduce the number of MPs from 650 to 100 and create a society which is more transparent, respectful of civil rights and the environment.

Once in a generation a leader comes along who looks like they could rewrite the rules. But it takes a certain type of personality to be capable of achieving this. Rory Stewart defies convention. At the same time, he is both the epitome of an establishment figure and the fabled man of the people. He is earnest yet refreshing. Could Rory Stewart be the prime minister Britain deserves?

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