Kemi Badenoch strode onto the conference stage to deliver a speech focused on how her party would cut national spending and painstakingly rebuild the economy after the “doom loop” of a Labour government.
The headline moment was a pricey home-owning rabbit pulled out of the hat, a pledge to scrap stamp duty in a paean to the Conservative dream of property ownership: a promise delivered to delighted applause.
Politics latest: Tories react to stamp duty announcement
We’re still awaiting the details – but last year, stamp duty raised more than £18bn for the Treasury, so that would eat up the majority of the £23bn in promised welfare savings.
It’s a clear statement of Conservative intent, delivered with a new-found confidence from a woman who has faced months of speculation about her leadership.
Unlike many of her previous speeches, this one didn’t dwell on the previous government’s mistakes.
Indeed, she said she wanted to celebrate the “great things” her party had done in 14 years in power – delivering Brexit, supporting Ukraine, and halving the deficit from 2010 to 2020.
The economic record of the past four years of Conservative government was unsurprisingly left unsaid. But the subtext has been clear throughout conference – a drive to rebuild the party’s reputation for economic competence following the economic disaster of Liz Truss’s mini-budget three years ago.
Now we’re told “only the Conservatives” can be trusted with the economy and border security, with Badenoch highlighting her “golden rule” of government spending aimed at reducing the deficit, reiterating the shadow chancellor’s promises to slash government spending by £47bn.
Unlike Sir Keir Starmer and Sir Ed Davey, Badenoch chose not to focus her attacks on Reform UK – conscious that many of her supporters are drawn to Nigel Farage’s ideas.
She doesn’t want to risk alienating them even further- particularly after a conference where we’ve seen a steady stream of local councillors announcing their defection from the Tories to Reform.
There were a few gentle jokes at their expense, highlighting Reform’s pledges to both slash taxes and expand public spending.
She claimed Farage is planning a free beer giveaway – and “shaking the same magic money tree” as Labour and the Lib Dems. But she didn’t repeat the “socialist” attack line we’ve heard from other Tories on Reform this conference.
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The driving force of this speech was an attack on the government, and a pledge to “clear up the mess left by Labour” – on the economy, on border security, and on sleaze.
Her Churchillian claim that “never in the field of human history have so many been let down by so few” earned her loud guffaws from the hall – followed by a roll-call of scandal-hit Labour figures – from former British Ambassador to the US Peter Mandelson to recently resigned deputy prime minister Angela Rayner.
The hall was full – and the party faithful keen to applaud.
They enjoyed Badenoch highlighting the challenge faced by the Tories in drawing a rather melodramatic equivalence with the fight against fascism in the Second World War, and the battle to “banish socialism and deliver prosperity” in the 1980s – evoking both Sir Winston Churchill and her political hero Margaret Thatcher.
They loved her declaration of undying love for the Conservative party, who she described as her family – “in many ways quite literally”, given that she married the deputy chairman of her local Conservative association.
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Badenoch doesn’t enjoy the level of devotion we’ve seen for her defeated leadership rival Robert Jenrick, who earned rapturous applause for his speech attacking activist judges on Tuesday – and polling shows he’s much more popular with the party membership.
But CCHQ will undoubtedly be relieved to have avoided the kind of outright rebellion we saw from Andy Burnham at Labour’s conference last week.
And given the delighted response from her headline announcement in the hall today – it looks like Badenoch has done enough to hold off her critics – at least for the time being.
