Clarke claims right-wing MPs plotting to deny him ballot win

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Portillo and Duncan Smith favourites for final round

Kenneth Clarke, the former chancellor, yesterday attacked a right-wing "plot" to deny him the Conservative leadership as he conceded that the odds were against him winning the contest.

With the first ballot of Conservative MPs due to take place tomorrow, Mr Clarke warned that the public would be "astonished" if he did not make it into a final run-off against Michael Portillo.

However, he said he was still talking to MPs to try to gain support to go forward into the postal ballot of all the party's 300,000 members.

Mr Clarke's remarks came as Iain Duncan Smith, the candidate likely to beat him to second place, and David Davis, another contender, set out their ideas for radical policies for the party. Mr Portillo, the front-runner, will attempt to stress his own "internationalist" credentials today when he meets all 15 EU ambassadors based in London.

Yesterday, Mr Clarke backed up claims by some of his supporters that there had been an active plot among right-wing MPs to keep him off the ballot of members. Some Portillo supporters have admitted they may support Mr Duncan Smith to prevent Mr Clarke from getting into the top two.

"The Conservative Party has been consumed by paranoia and plotting. When the right wing aren't plotting against people like me, they appear to plot against each other," Mr Clarke said. "I think the bookies have got it about right. I am odds against but I don't think that I am an outsider."

"The two who I suspect [the public] regard as the 'prime minister candidates' who could take on Tony Blair and at this stage in their careers and look like potential prime ministers are Michael Portillo and myself," he told Sky News's Sunday with Adam Boulton.

Mr Davis, the right-wing former Europe minister who is seen as an outsider in the contest, refused to say whether he would withdraw from the race if he finished fourth in Tuesday's ballot.

"I was the dark horse candidate coming from the back of the field. I am already into the field now and would expect, as people drop out, I would accelerate towards the front. That is how our strategy is designed," he told the BBC's Breakfast with Frost.

"Having said that, I used to be a mountaineer and one thing I never did when I climbed was think about falling off. I am not going to do it now."

Mr Duncan Smith attempted to underline his own Thatcherite roots when he called for parents to be allowed to use state funding for their children to pay for places in private schools instead.

"You have got to break the stranglehold of failure for people who only want the best for their children," he said. "That is the key message. It is not about privatisation versus the state. It is about a state monopoly that is grinding people down versus competition."

Mr Portillo said he would use his meeting with the EU ambassadors to "end the myth that we are hostile to all things Europe". The shadow Chancellor will say that the Tories should work with sister parties in the Continent on public sector policies, boosting free markets and developing alternatives to deeper political integration of the EU.

"The Conservative Party must be internationalist," he said. "Under my leadership I would wish to work with other centre and centre-right European parties, on policies, both for Britain and for Europe.

"I believe Britain should have its own currency, but Conservative arguments would carry more weight if they're seen to come from a party which is internationalist and engaged in friendly debate with our neighbours."

Michael Ancram, the former party chairman who is the fifth leadership contender, will call today for a monthly question time between the Shadow Cabinet and the public over the internet.