Michael Gove has admitted that Theresa May was “right” to sack him from the Cabinet after she took office as Prime Minister.
The former education secretary said he "made mistakes" during his final weeks in office, during which time he "knifed" his former ally Boris Johnson as he mounted a sensational bid for the Tory leadership.
Mr Johnson then withdrew from the race, paving the way for Mrs May to take office as the UK’s second ever female Prime Minister.
Asked by the BBC about the aftermath of the bloody leadership battle, Mr Gove said: “When Theresa became Prime Minister she said that she no longer had a place for me in the Cabinet and, to be honest, if I'd been in her shoes I would have sacked me too. So I entirely accept that sacking me at the time was the right thing to do.
"I had six years when I was a government minister, I had a chance to make a difference - I hope that I did.”
He added: "I have to accept that the way in which I spent the final week or so of my ministerial life involved my making mistakes and having made mistakes you have to take the consequences."
Mr Gove, 49, also revealed that the relationship he and his wife Sarah Vine had enjoyed with David and Samantha Cameron had suffered since the EU referendum campaign, during which the Surrey Heath MP was a prominent figure in the Leave campaign.
He said that despite the couples having previously been close friends, Mr Gove and Vine have not had a "proper conversation" with the Camerons since the June 23 poll.
He said the decision to campaign against Cameron for EU withdrawal "wasn't easy", but he felt that "it was better to say to David that I couldn't support him and to go with my heart than to suppress my feelings on the matter".
Mr Cameron "knew I was a Eurosceptic, but he thought I would either keep schtum or ... say 'I am going to support the Prime Minister'," he said.
Mr Gove said he was now focusing on his work on the Commons Committee on Exiting the EU and wanted to campaign for children at risk of abuse or neglect.
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"I had a chance to argue for things that I believed in," he said. "And I will also have the chance, I hope, in the future to be able to argue for other things in which I believe, to make a contribution."
