Ashby MP Andrew Bridgen says that Boris Johnson has 'done the right thing' by resigning as Prime Minister today (Thursday).

Mr Bridgen, Conservative MP for North West Leicestershire, has been calling for Johnson to go for some time and twice handed in letters of no confidence to the 1922 Committee.

He was seeking election to the committee next week where Mr Bridgen intended to help force through a rule change that would oust the Prime Minister just a month after surviving a confidence vote.

The Chris Pincher scandal proved to the straw after revelations emerged about the Tamworth MP's previous discretions.

News broke this morning (Thursday) of the Prime Ministers's decision to finally stand down after more than 50 ministers quit in around 36 hours.

Mr Bridgen told BBC News: "I think we've seen that even Boris Johnson couldn't defy political gravity forever.

"He's done the right thing finally, and put the country first.

"Now we can move forwards.

"There are three ways a Prime Minister can be removed; a vote of the whole house; a vote of the Conservative Party in a no-confidence motion; or the collapse of a government.

"Boris Johnson was in a position where nobody wanted to serve under him and he couldn't fill his vacancies in Cabinet or Government.

"The Government wasn't going to work this morning because bill committees didn't have any ministers."

But Mr Bridgen added that there must be a clean break with talk of the Prime Minister staying until a successor has been put in place.

He added: "Damage can be limited if Boris goes straight away and we have an interim Prime Minister while we sort out our leadership issues.

"I think history will be kinder to Boris Johnson than I probably will be today or for the next week or two, or maybe the public will be.

":He will be remembered as the man who got us through Brexit and Covid, two enormous emergencies which most Prime Ministers would never see no matter how long they were in office.

"He got us through those and now we need to move on.

"But my concerns started a year ago when he tried to have Sir Graham Brady replaced from the 1922 Committee and put in his own person.

"That started the alarm bells ringing for me and started to lose confidence in him.

"The timing is perfect, we will have a new party leader in place well before the party conference."