Several of the questions in our end-of-year survey have looked back, asking our readers to pick out the minister or back-bench MP they feel has impressed the most in 2019.
Yet as we welcome 2020 we also asked them to look ahead, and identify the Conservative they think is most likely to be going places in the year ahead.
Of course, the shortlist wasn’t compiled at random and we’re likely to hear from all four of the candidates. But our panellists have backed Rishi Sunak by a decisive margin – perhaps not surprisingly, since he currently holds one of the most senior non-Cabinet positions in the Government and represented the Party in two of last month’s election debates.
The running up, again by a clear margin, is Johnny Mercer, who has been leading the campaign to end the ‘witch hunt’ against British ex-servicemen who served in Northern Ireland.