London mayor to be UK PM? Not yet

London Mayor Boris Johnson eclipsed British Prime Minister David Cameron as Olympic host this summer, but the eccentric Conservative will have to bide his time before mounting any serious challenge for the top job.

Johnson followed up his Olympic antics – dangling from a zip line waving the national flag and speeches extolling British success – with criticism of Cameron's handling of the economy, prompting speculation he was already plotting to replace him.

An opinion poll this week suggested the mayor could revive the flagging popularity of the centre-right Conservatives, who have ruled in uneasy coalition with the left-leaning Liberal Democrats since 2010.

The Conservatives could make up a 13-point lead now held by their Labour opponents if Johnson took over, the YouGov poll for the Sun newspaper showed, reviving talk he may seek, with other  dissenters, to oust Cameron before the 2015 parliamentary poll. Many in the party play that down.

The whole thing is delightful Westminster gossip, but no more than that, Conservative lawmaker and member of the party's influential 1922 Committee Bernard Jenkin said. Johnson, a formidable campaigner with a gift for persuading voters of all hues to like him, has no parliamentary seat, so to take over before 2015 he would have to step down as mayor and seize his chance in a bye-election if a seat became vacant.

In the future, anything is possible but there is not going to be regicide on David Cameron, Jenkin said. The idea that somehow Boris is going to get into parliament, destabilise the leadership, is just absolutely for the birds.

Johnson, 48, has dismissed as complete cloud cuckoo land speculation that he might seek election to parliament during his mayoral term, which finishes in 2016, and said, with his trademark informality, that he would be clapped out by then.

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