LABOUR has stepped up calls for a general election following a bruising weekend for the Tories, with former PM Boris Johnson dramatically resigning his seat on Friday night.

Mr Johnson’s resignation came shortly after that of his close ally Nadine Dorries, and was followed up swiftly by that of a third Tory MP, Nigel Adams of Selby and Ainsty, exposing the government to three looming by-elections.

Shadow chief secretary to the Treasury Pat McFadden told Sophy Ridge on Sunday there would be no cure for the “chaos” under the current government and echoed calls from Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer for a general election.

“This is going to continue in the Conservative Party and they cannot fix it themselves. The only way to fix this is to have a general election and a change of government,” Mr McFadden said.

Shadow foreign secretary David Lammy made the same call on the BBC, refusing to answer questions from Laura Kuenssberg on why Labour’s lead had narrowed recently but insisting the country faced huge problems and could not afford a government at war with itself.

“When I speak to voters they talk about mortgages, inflation, cost of living, not being able to get a GP appointment, waiting for cancer care. We are in serious times, our country needs to move forward for a unified purpose,” he said.

Speculation ran wild over Mr Johnson’s political future following his resignation, which he blamed on a Commons privileges committee investigation into Downing Street lockdown-breaching knees-ups held while he was PM.

Deriding the committee as a “kangaroo court” whose purpose was “to find me guilty regardless of the facts” after seeing an as yet unpublished report on his conduct, Mr Johnson said his removal from power was part of a wider plot to reverse Brexit.

Tory rightwinger Jacob Rees-Mogg suggested that Mr Johnson should be allowed to return to Parliament as a Tory MP if he stood again, saying blocking him would start a “civil war,” and even hinted in the Mail on Sunday that he could return to the leadership.

Yet other Tory grandees including former home secretary Michael Howard said Mr Johnson would not return to Tory politics any time soon — while Ukip founder Nigel Farage suggested Johnson could become the nucleus of a new right-wing populist “insurgency.”