Column: The challenges facing Kemi Badenoch…
Politicians, the public often decry, lack real-world experience.
Whether it be running a business, working in healthcare, serving in the armed forces, anything that demonstrates their ‘feet on the ground’ credentials is a plus.
It covers parents too. Just look at Keir Starmer’s oft-touted “toolmaker father”; Rishi Sunak, the “son of a pharmacist; and even the ultimate “grocer’s daughter”, Margaret Thatcher.
Similarly, professional politicians run the risk of appearing boring, or nondescript. All the rough edges burnished off, in their identikit suits, never veering too far from the party line.
Any harmless quirky traits or interests, therefore, will be talked up endlessly, in the hopes of making them stand out from the crowd.
From chess fanatic Rachel Reeves; Jeremy Corbyn’s allotment and jam-making; or former Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross’ football refereeing, it can feel like they’re all at it.
Proponents of shiny new Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, however, would argue she struggles in none of these areas.
Her experience as an computer engineer – a thread that ran throughout her leadership campaign – as well as her family story, born to a GP father and academic mother, and growing up in Lagos, Nigeria, tick those boxes. Whereas the words boring, nondescript and identikit, are hardly in her vocabulary.
But the newly installed Tory leader – the first black woman to lead a political party in Westminster – is likely to face a number of challenges of her own.
Appointing her shadow cabinet this week has indicated one of them. While Badenoch insisted on Tuesday that her frontbench drew on talent from across the party, “just as I promised during the campaign”, SW1 watchers instantly spotted the absence of not just one former leadership rival – but two.
With certified big beast James Cleverly and One Nation-er Tom Tugendhat returning to the backbenches, there is a notable focus on those who backed the North West Essex MP early in her rise – which already appears to be raising eyebrows in Westminster.
Badenoch’s strength among party members was her outspoken quality and reluctance to shy away from difficult issues. But this is tempered with her absence of the charm required to build the necessary bridges within a fractious and historically broad-church of a party.
Notably averse to tea room chatter, her choice of Nigel Huddleston – a patron of the One Nation-ist Tory Reform Group – and right-leaning former investment minister Lord Dominic Johnson as party co-chairmen suggest Badenoch is aware of the need to ride both horses.
Similarly, the Conservatives will need to rebuild an activist base.
Local elections in May 2025 may feel at a distance now, but much as Keir Starmer’s path to power was paved with by-election victories, Badenoch will be hoping she and her team can pull off a similar route.
This will require time, it will demand donor money, and, most of all, need the kind of energy and belief from volunteers who truly think their candidate can win.
But perhaps her most pressing challenge is to reformulate her vibes-based campaign into a policy platform that chimes with potential voters.
Badenoch is an ideological politician – an interesting foil to Starmer’s managerialism – and has firmly staked her anti-woke, small state position in the battle of ideas.
That said, wanting principles to come before policy, as she argued in her campaign pamphlet ‘Conservatism in Crisis’, is all very well – unless you’re leading a political party.
“When people say we just need to deliver policy X or policy Y, and then everything will be fine again, they are kidding us and themselves,” Badenoch wrote.
Her party conference speech promised to “rewire” the British state, to reconsider “every aspect of what the state does…and why it does it”, from international treaties to the Treasury, Bank of England and health service.
It’s an admirably thorough pitch. But, does it connect to the concerns of the voters she will need to win over, and is this potentially an issue for her?
There is already plenty for Conservative voters – or unhappy Labour-lites – to take issue with under the new government.
Whether it be winter fuel for pensioners, inheritance tax on farms and family businesses, or rising tuition fees, easy successes for an opposition party hoping to rebuild lie in taking on specific government policies, and clearly articulating what you’d do differently in power.
With the first Keir vs Kemi PMQs still ahead, it’s early days for her administration. But Badenoch may find she needs to define herself – or allow her opponents to do it for her.