Kemi Badenoch’s rapid rise in politics is striking. After losing bids to be an MP in 2010, then to be a London Assembly Member in 2012 (she was later appointed as an Assembly Member in 2015) she entered the Commons in 2017 via a safe Tory seat. In 2019, despite serving as an MP for just a couple years, she was touted as a contender for No 10. She also ran for the leadership in 2022. 

Despite eyeing  the top job for some time, she fudged her second leadership launch speech this September, claiming that countries within the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) are deporting 70-80 per cent of illegal immigrants. The implication of this bold assertion is that leaving the ECHR is unnecessary. But there is little evidence to back up her claim.

Among ECHR member states, France, Germany, and Sweden are among the countries deporting the most illegal immigrants, and none of them are removing even half of their illegal immigrants — never mind the figures Badenoch referred to.

Her stance on the ECHR remains worryingly unclear, despite its obvious hindrance to detaining and deporting people swiftly. She has not outlined plans to leave it, but has alternated between dismissing calls to exit the treaty, and claiming that leaving it would not be “radical enough”.

At the time Badenoch proudly admitted to having personally lobbying for more immigration

But what of her record on legal migration, which after all is responsible for the bulk of the unprecedented numbers of new arrivals? Badenoch has currently refused to commit to a cap on numbers, while blaming rising figures on “woke” civil servants.Yet in 2018, it was her who enthusiastically backed the removal of caps on Tier 2 visas, allowing more “skilled” immigrants into UK jobs. In reality, visas were often handed out for jobs paying around or below the average wage. At the time Badenoch proudly admitted to having personally lobbying for more immigration, despite such policies flagrantly ignoring the concerns of many voters, especially in the aftermath of the Brexit vote.

Badenoch’s understanding of divisions and rising sectarianism across swathes of the country is equally wanting. She recently argued that the UK needed to “start again” with a new “integration strategy”, without outlining what such a “strategy” would involve. We already have entire towns and cities of people that live in completely different cultural universes.

Badenoch has been patted on the back by media giants like Trevor Philips for “asking the right question on integration”. But the time for simply “asking the right question” has long since passed. It is simply not good enough after decades of failure upon failure from Islamist terrorism to grooming gangs, and when pro-Hamas mobs now seem to dominate central London most Saturdays. The most striking and overlooked story of the last general election was the emergence of a caucus of independent MPs who ran specifically for their sectarian anti-Israel views.

How is a “new strategy” possible if certain immigrant groups do not wish to integrate or are actively hostile to the host culture? Or if parts of the country itself no longer seem sure of what it is, and what it will and will not accept? Voters feel rightly betrayed by decades of mass immigration which they have consistently voted against, and mere lip service to their complaints is no longer going to brush.

As Minister for Women and Equalities (2020-2024), Badenoch frequently courted controversy but struggled to implement effective policies, particularly in addressing the rise of extreme progressive ideologies within the public sector, including in her own Department. Indeed, as GB News’ Steven Edginton highlights, Badenoch has lavished praise on the government’s multi-million pound funding of progressive, grievance mongering, anti-free speech groups like the Race Equality Foundation, at the same time as bemoaning the same critical theory claptrap they espouse.

Perhaps Badenoch has more in common with her would-be intersectional opponents then she readily admits? Using “White” as a pejorative is generally thought to be a preserve of such Leftist radicals, but Badenoch dismissed her former University of Sussex classmates as “stupid lefty white kids” in an interview earlier this year She also slammed Doctor Who actor David Tennant as a “rich, lefty, white male celebrity” when sparring with him over gender identity. Would she have gotten away with this if her detractors had been Black or Asian?

While serving in various Trade Department roles she slashed down the target number of European Union laws to be binned from 4,000 to just 800. She still failed to reach even this slimmed down ambition. Her remarks on maternity pay and the minimum wage were odd, and her claim to having “become working class” while taking a part-time job at McDonald’s-despite her thoroughly middle-class upbringing-suggests she has failed to grasp the nuance and subtleties of the British class system. If she does not understand this, and how to navigate it, what else is she overlooking?

the modish meme that Badenoch is poised to be the British Right’s saviour … needs to be countered

Badenoch has happily slated the Tory governments she served under for “talking right, but governing left,” but her actions imply she would govern similarly. This is not to say that other candidates are exemplary. I am not a Tory member and therefore will not vote for who becomes leader, nor will I publicly back any candidate. However, the modish meme that Badenoch is poised to be the British Right’s saviour — seemingly because she complains about Stonewall every so often — needs to be countered and quick.

Yet James Cleverly is seen more openly as a centrist, and someone who is too closely tied to the previous government-and its failures. He would likely lead the Tories to defeat, and an exodus of members to Reform. Robert Jenrick, despite his more centrist history, dramatically resigned as immigration minister in protest of Sunak’s failures. He has also committed to leaving the ECHR. If he were to buck the trend of Tory politicians and actually follow through on this pledge, he would be able to both outflank Reform’s lately amateurish approach, and pressure them to shape-up or disappear, in a way that a Badenoch or Cleverly leadership likely would not.