His successor Andrew RT Davies continued his strategy of making the party more supportive of devolution but also adopted a more populist approach as leader.

[15][16] Two months into his leadership in the assembly,[17] Richards was arrested and charged for inflicting grievous bodily harm to a 22-year-old woman in Kew, London, on 22 July 1999.

[18][19] Richards denied the charges but left his role as leader of the Welsh Conservative Group on 5 August for a temporary period to focus on his defence, promising to return once he had proved his innocence.

[22] Considered to be his protégé, Richards wanted Davies to serve as his successor should he officially resign from the leadership and he tried to prevent Bourne from succeeding him instead.

[23][24][25] The appointment of Davies as acting leader, who was 29 years old at the time, proved controversial with other members of the Welsh Conservative Group, who claimed he was "too inexperienced" to lead the party.

[15][28] A leadership election within the group to determine whether to re-elect Richards as leader had already been scheduled for November, but his premature temporary resignation meant that the UK party was now considering whether to push it forward to August.

[29][22] The members who attended this meeting included Bourne, Alun Cairns, Jonathan Morgan, Glyn Davies and David Melding.

[31][15] In response to the allegations against Richards, the party leadership chose to endorse Bourne for the position of acting leader rather than Davies at the meeting.

[31] Richards then announced his permanent resignation as leader of the Welsh Conservative Group in the National Assembly for Wales, stating that his leadership and authority had been "undermined" by their decision to replace Davies with Bourne, and that as a result he had "no choice" but to step down.

[34] The paper's political correspondent Richard Hazlewood said the nominations process was widely seen in the party as just a formality to install Bourne as the official leader of the Welsh Conservative Group.

[36] According to BBC News, he had secured the support of most of the Conservative AMs by 16 August, not including Richards or his deputy David TC Davies.

[38][39][40] Bourne praised Davies for his conduct during the election and gave him a new role as the member of the Welsh Conservative frontbench responsible for policy presentation.

[40] Bourne pledged to hold the Labour administration to account and to focus his party in the assembly on issues relating to farming, the Welsh NHS and European aid.

[44][45][24] In response to his suspension, Richards called Bourne a "prat" during an assembly session and hosted a press conference where he accused most members of the Welsh Conservative Group of having taken part in a conspiracy to remove him as leader.

[24][46] He defended his former deputy David TC Davies, claiming that he was not involved in the alleged conspiracy, but denounced the seven other AMs in the group as Nick Bourne's "malevolent seven", describing the meeting where they voted to suspend him as a "kangaroo court".

[44][47] Richards continued to sit in the assembly as an Independent Conservative before retiring from the institution in 2002,[45] and he was cleared of all charges related to the grievous bodily harm accusations in June 2000.

Under Bourne's leadership the Conservatives in Wales, now under the control of a more moderate faction that generally accepted devolution, saw a significant change to their political strategy as compared to under Richards, with Bourne working with the Welsh Conservatives' main adviser on policy David Melding to make the party more distinctly Welsh in identity and generally supportive of devolution.