Tag: United Kingdom

The Conservative leader is often accused, not least of all by this commentator, of constructing her arguments based on a skim of her social media feed — from which she duly draws a litany of pugnacious anti-Labour material. By repeating the Online Right’s favourite lines back at them, Kemi Badenoch can usually count on a few retweets. That is how LOTO measures success at PMQs, we are led to assume.

But social media kudos does not generate the Westminster weather — the dismal write-ups of Badenoch first 100 days as Tory leader are ample proof. Perhaps this point explains her change of tack today.

This afternoon, the Conservative leader regurgitated — headline by headline — the front page splashes of those newspapers most friendly to the party. The Daily Telegraph and Mail newsdesks in effect dictated Badenoch PMQs script this afternoon. Unfortunately for the Conservative leadership however, the session arrived at an all too familiar conclusion.

First, the Tory leader grilled the prime minister on the UK’s immigration and refugee rules after the Telegraph reported on the case of a Palestinian family, who were granted the right to live in the UK after applying through a scheme meant for Ukrainian refugees.

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The Conservative leader said the decision, handed down by a judge, was “completely wrong, it cannot be allowed to stand”. She asked if the government would appeal the verdict.

“She is right”, Keir Starmer responded. “It is the wrong decision.”

But the prime minister went on to point out the grave error in Badenoch’s question, framed as an attack on the government’s immigration stance. He added: “She hasn’t quite done her homework because the decision in question was taken under the last government.”

Starmer closed: “It should be parliament that makes the rules on immigration, it should be the government that makes the policy, that is the principle and the home secretary is already looking at the legal loophole which we need to close in this particular case”.

But Badenoch was not done. Undaunted by the prime minister’s steady, assured response, the Tory leader insisted Starmer had “not answered the question.”

“If he plans to appeal, then the appeal may be unsuccessful and the law will need to be changed”, she began. “The issue we are discussing today is about judicial systems. We cannot be in a situation where we allow enormous numbers of people to exploit our laws in this way.”

She called on the prime minister to commit to bringing forward legislation to address any possible gap in the law, or amend the asylum bill that is currently making its way through parliament.

Starmer cooly referred back to his previous answer and informed Badenoch that the home secretary, Yvette Cooper, is already “working on closing this loophole”.

Then came the obligatory swipe at the Conservative Party’s record on immigration — a risk Badenoch consciously ran with this line of questioning. “They lost control of immigration”, Starmer said. Referring to the government’s borders bill, he accused the Conservatives of voting “against increased powers to deal with those that are running the vile trade of people smuggling”.

Badenoch was visibly affronted by the prime minister’s comeback. “If the prime minister was on top of his brief, perhaps he would be able to answer some questions”, she blasted.

Facing crescendoing heckles from the Labour benches, Badenoch called on the government to bring forward legal changes to clarify how the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) should be treated in UK law. She asked: “Does he agree that we should legislate even if lawyers warn that this might be incompatible with human rights law?”

At this juncture, the prime minister had had enough.

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“She complains about scripted answers and questions, her script doesn’t allow her to listen to the answer”, Starmer responded. “She asked me if we’re going to change the law and close the loophole in question one, I said yes. She asked me again in question two, and I said yes. She asked me again in question three, it’s still yes.”

Conservative MPs found themselves stunned into silence and awkward expressions crept onto the faces of Robert Jenrick and Chris Philp, who flanked Badenoch as her frontbench outriders this afternoon.

The Tory leader had been stifled by her own script. Her response reflected her understandable frustration. “He’s not listening, he is too busy defending the international law framework”, Badenoch said.

The buffering Conservative leader had gotten stuck on the minutiae of her first question and the prime minister’s reply. While Starmer did not directly declare he would look to appeal the verdict, he did answer in a more substantive sense, revealing the government would address the “loophole” itself.

As such, by refusing to shift her focus and accept that not every question she asks from the despatch box will receive a specific acknowledgement, Badenoch lost any semblance of momentum. The Conservative leader’s apparent inability to recognise the direction of a debate reflects poorly on her alleged attack-dog acumen — so lauded by her allies during the 2024 leadership election.

It also shows an inability, on behalf of Badenoch’s inner circle, to game out the prime minister’s answers and respond accordingly. One supposes the strategy was to ask very specific questions and, at every turn, call out Starmer for sidestepping. But the approach missed — and misses — the raw politics of prime minister’s questions. The Conservative leader’s technical rejoinders on the minutiae of the exchange reflect a serious lack of thoughtful planning by her PMQs team. She was left carping from the sidelines about some minor moot detail, as Starmer marched ahead.

Badenoch used her fourth question to make a more general point in an attempt to break into a wider stride. “This is precisely why we need to break the conveyor belt from arriving in the UK, to acquiring indefinite leave to remain, and then a British passport, and now a right to bring six family members here as well”, Badenoch insisted.

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She asked the prime minister: “Will he now support our plans to toughen the process on indefinite leave to remain and make getting a British passport a privilege, not a right?”

Badenoch’s reference to her first and only policy as Conservative leader invited Starmer’s return with a Labour attack line. He hit back: “They presided over record high levels of immigration. It reached nearly one million. It was a one nation experiment in open borders.”

For her final question, Badenoch switched papers and referenced a recent Daily Mail scoop. She accused the government of recruiting a chief inspector of borders who “lives in Finland and wants to work from home”. She asked why the British public should put up with this.

Starmer instantly countered that the individual in question was appointed in 2019 by the last government. He then worked from Finland for the following five years.

“We’ve changed that and he is now going to be working from the United Kingdom full time”, Starmer proclaimed.

Once again, it is striking just how poorly researched Badenoch’s questions are. The Conservative leader read the Daily Mail splash this morning and did no further digging, no checking of details — no deep thinking about how the attack line might backfire.

The exchange rather lends credence to the prime minister’s claim, issued in his first answer, that Badenoch does not do her “homework”. At the same time, the Tory leader accuses Starmer of not being across the detail. The whole approach is simply bizarre.

In her final question, Badenoch had also noted there are “very serious questions” being asked about the attorney general Lord Hermer, referencing comments made by Lord Glasman, the leading Labour peer, this week. “If we are serious about protecting our borders we need to make sure we appoint people who believe in our country and everything we stand for”, Badenoch said.

Starmer closed: “She talks about the attorney general. She sat round the cabinet table with an attorney who was later sacked for breaching national security.”

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This was, and I refuse to caveat this point, a truly miserable performance by Badenoch. There was no sense of invention, no strategic nous or rhetorical force. Her material, borne of the Telegraph and the Mail, was poor — but her delivery and overall performance was worse. Starmer was right to label the whole thing “tedious”. Perhaps that particular adjective is too kind.

It is right that Badenoch, as Conservative leader, only has a narrow room for manoeuvre. She remains hostage to her party’s record on the economy, on public services — and on immigration in particular. And yet, she feels duty-bound to address the latter topic to appease the right-wing press and fight back against Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

What little political space Badenoch has been afforded, however, she has proven singularly unable to exploit.

Let’s step back. The Conservative leader’s reputation as a combative commons operator was supposed to exact crucial gains for her party at prime minister’s questions. By relentlessly mauling Starmer, Badenoch could accomplish what Jenrick, James Cleverly and Tom Tugendhat could not. Her early successes would impede Reform’s insurgency and win plaudits in the press.

But Badenoch is consistently dispatched by Starmer — whom Tories simultaneously ridicule as wooden and grey. The Conservative leader has surprised everyone with quite how poor she is at the part of the job her advocates insisted she would excel at.

Let’s cut that down: the Conservative leader has surprised everyone with quite how poor she is.

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UK needs ‘cool and clear-headed’ response to Trump steel tariffs, says trade minister

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‘The prime minister has so far sat back and allowed Donald Trump and his sidekick Elon Musk to ride roughshod over UK interests while the Conservatives and Nigel Farage cheer them on.

‘The government needs to draw up plans for Tesla tariffs to hit Musk where it hurts, if Trump’s administration follows through with their threats to the UK steel industry’

—  Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey calls on the government to draw up plans for retaliatory “Tesla tariffs” on Elon Musk’s electric vehicle firm if Donald Trump carries out his threat to hit the UK steel industry with a 25% tariff on exports to America.

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Former Green Party leader Caroline Lucas has warned that recent changes to immigration rules that bar anyone entering the UK illegally from ever getting British citizenship will “strengthen” Nigel Farage’s Reform UK. 

The Home Office’s good character guidance, updated on Monday, now says that entering the UK illegally will “normally” result in a refused citizenship – no matter how long the applicant has lived in the UK.

Another new entry to the guidance reads: “A person who applies for citizenship from 10 February 2025 who has previously arrived without a required valid entry clearance or electronic travel authorisation, having made a dangerous journey will normally be refused citizenship.

“A dangerous journey includes, but is not limited to, travelling by small boat or concealed in a vehicle or other conveyance.”

The change to the rules, first disclosed by the Free Movement website, makes it almost impossible for anyone who arrived on a small boat across the English Channel to ever get British citizenship.

Under the previous guidance, refugees who arrived in the UK by irregular routes would be required to wait 10 years before being considered for citizenship.

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Reacting to the changes, Walthamstow MP Stella Creasy told BBC Radio’s Today programme on Wednesday: “I want to make it clear that I voted for the legislation on Monday, because I think it is important that we repeal the Rwanda legislation, the madness and the money that we spent on that scheme, and that we do actually support a border force.

“This change [to the Home Office guidance] was not part of that process.”

Creasy, who has served as an MP since 2010, added: “I think this change is counterproductive to the message that we want to send about being proud of our country and the role that it has played in supporting those fleeing persecution.”

Caroline Lucas, who served as a Green Party MP from 2010 to 2024, warned that Labour’s “performative cruelty” is likely to strengthen Reform UK.

Writing on X, Lucas said: “Denying refugees citizenship simply on the grounds that they arrived here ‘illegally’ on small boats when there are no legal routes for most of them to use takes cynicism to new heights.

“And such performative cruelty won’t see off Reform – it’s more likely to strengthen them.”

It comes after the second reading of the new border security bill on Monday, which sets out Labour’s plan to treat people smugglers like terrorists, and creates a new crime of endangering another person during an illegal crossing in the Channel.

Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.

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The government has updated its guidance to prevent people who arrive in the UK illegally, or made a “dangerous journey”, from getting British citizenship.

An update to the Home Office’s guidance for caseworkers, entitled Nationality: Good Character Requirement, states that anyone applying for British citizenship from Monday who arrived in the UK illegally “will normally be refused, regardless of the time that has passed since the illegal entry took place”.

Another new entry to that guidance reads: “A person who applies for citizenship from 10 February 2025 who has previously arrived without a required valid entry clearance or electronic travel authorisation, having made a dangerous journey will normally be refused citizenship.

“A dangerous journey includes, but is not limited to, travelling by small boat or concealed in a vehicle or other conveyance.”

The change to the rules, first disclosed by the Free Movement blog, makes it almost impossible for anyone who arrived on a small boat across the English Channel to ever get British citizenship. Previously, refugees who had arrived on a small boat would have needed to wait 10 years before being considered for citizenship.

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A Home Office spokesperson said in a statement: “There are already rules that can prevent those arriving illegally from gaining citizenship.

“This policy guidance further strengthens measures to make it clear that anyone who enters the UK illegally, including small boat arrivals, faces having a British citizenship application refused.”

Stella Creasy, the Labour MP for Walthamstow, called for the guidance to be reverted “as soon as possible”.

She wrote on X: “This should be changed asap. If we give someone refugee status, it can’t be right to then refuse them route to become a British citizen, to say they can have a home in our country, but never a place in our society and be forever second class.”

Colin Yeo, an immigration barrister and editor of the Free Movement blog, wrote on Bluesky: “This is bad, full stop. It creates a class of person who are forever excluded from civic life no matter how long they live here. It’s also a clear breach of the refugee convention.”

Enver Solomon, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said: “This change flies in the face of reason. The British public want refugees who have been given safety in our country to integrate into and contribute to their new communities, so it makes no sense for the government to erect more barriers.

“We know that men, women and children who are refugees want to feel part of the country that has given them a home, and support to rebuild their lives.”

“So many refugees over many generations have become proud, hard-working British citizens, as doctors, entrepreneurs and other professionals. Becoming a British citizen has helped them give back to their communities and this should be celebrated, not prevented. We urge ministers to urgently reconsider.”

It comes after Labour’s new border security bill, which scraps the previous government’s Rwanda deportation scheme and boosts police powers against people smugglers, cleared its first vote in the House of Commons on Monday.

The Border Security, Asylum and Immigration Bill sets out Labour’s plan to treat people smugglers like terrorists, and creates a new crime of endangering another person during an illegal crossing in the Channel.

Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.

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The Conservative leadership is imitating the political strategy that catapulted Donald Trump back to the White House, with a sustained focus on “new media” platforms — in favour of the Westminster studios Kemi Badenoch famously abhors.

The Tory leader, who disdains SW1-based “old media” duties, marked her 100-day milestone in the role with a wide-ranging interview on the podcast “Triggernometry”. On the show, hosted by commentator double act Konstantin Kisin and Francis Foster, Badenoch was asked about the threat posed to the Conservative Party by Reform UK; immigration, both legal and illegal; net zero; and Britain’s general decline among other topics.

Badenoch’s reflections received a mixed reaction from Triggernometry’s regular viewers. At the time of writing, the over one hour-long interview had around 3,700 likes on YouTube — with circa 2,600, mainly scathing, comments. It’s a “ratio” that reflects viewer disquiet. “I hope you read this Kemi”, one representative commenter remarks. “Never again should your party or Labour be anywhere near power”. Another reads: “I won’t be voting for her, or conservative [sic] ever again”.

The reaction, to some extent, reflects the scale of the challenge Badenoch faces if she is to repair trust in the Conservative Party over the coming years. But perhaps the backlash justifies the ostensible strategy: to re-engage with and persuade right-wing critics. Donald Trump, of course, found significant success with a similar approach throughout the 2024 US presidential election. During the race for the White House, Trump sat down with a rolling roster of podcasters, streamers and vloggers — on the advice of Baron, his 18-year-old son.

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Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ) is talking up the Trump parallels. In an email to mark Badenoch’s first 100 days as leader, party chair Nigel Huddleston informed members: “As we also saw in the USA, engagement with the non-traditional media outlets, such as podcasts, is vital to connecting with younger, more online audiences.

“In November Kemi went on Honestly, with Bari Weiss. She spoke about her background, why she joined the Conservatives and how she wants to do politics differently.

“On Sunday Kemi appeared on TRIGGERnometry. She elaborated on how we fix our broken immigration system and she spoke about net zero and the civil service.”

Huddleston added: “There’s a lot we can learn from our sister parties around the world. Particularly those who’ve recently taken their party from opposition into Government.”

There are, however, significant differences between Badenoch’s embrace of online platforms and that which powered Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign. The most obvious is this: Trump, a former president, was treated to mainly softball questions by friendly “new media” stars — individuals like Joe Rogan, Spotify’s most listened to podcaster; Logan Paul, the YouTuber-turned-wrestler; and Theo Von, a comedian.

While far from antagonistic, Badenoch’s appearance on Triggernometry was characterised by genuinely tough questions — framed from a right-wing perspective — about the Conservative Party’s failure in office. The audience, as we have established, was a largely unfriendly one. Many will not have voted for the Conservatives at the last election, some might have moved to Reform since. Ultimately, Badenoch’s 3,700 “like” total compares to just under 10,000 for a video (admittedly released last week) discussing grooming gangs with GB News investigative journalist Charlie Peters.

New media in Britain is also not nearly as far evolved as in the United States — in terms of both the audience count and, perhaps more significantly, its fusion of politics and entertainment. Triggernometry is a politics podcast, listened to mostly by individuals who agree with it. The Joe Rogan Experience does not concern itself with genre, and is listened to by a more ideologically diverse audience.

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In short, Trump’s embrace of new media was a direct gateway to undecided, perhaps even under-engaged, (mainly male) voters. Badenoch’s appearance on Triggernometry does not offer the same kind of electoral-political opportunity. Triggernometry’s average viewer is likely extremely engaged and trenchantly anti-Tory.

Badenoch’s new media strategy does, however, come with significant risks. One common criticism of the Conservative leader is that her engagement with online political spaces, on Elon Musk’s X for instance, distorts her politics.

Badenoch’s recent appearances at prime minister’s questions have been characterised by the deployment of tropes and talking points familiar in Online Right fora. She has suggested the prime minister committed a “cover up” over the grooming gangs scandal — and in the session last week blasted “eco-nutters” together with the “immoral surrender” of the Chagos Islands. There was also a “bend the knee” reference, which was surely lost on the average viewer.

The danger for Badenoch is as follows: her engagement with a right wing cultural space that has yet to fully interact with mainstream opinion risks drawing the Conservative Party away from the median voter.

In any case, this is territory that is monopolised — in a party-political sense — by Nigel Farage’s Reform UK. Does Badenoch really believe she can outcompete Farage in a battle for the affections of the Very Online Right? Perhaps more pertinently, is this battle worth risking the alienation of existing as well as potential voters, who are attracted to outfits to Badenoch’s left?

The Liberal Democrats, lest Badenoch forgets, exist. The Conservative Party lost 59 seats to them in England in 2024. Indeed, a YouGov poll this week revealed that while Badenoch and Farage are level (22 per cent) on the measure of “who would make the better prime minister”, the Conservative leader trails Ed Davey. In a head-to-head match-up, the Lib Dem leader is rated as the better PM by 26 per cent. Just 17 per cent prefer Badenoch.

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Badenoch risks tumbling down an ideological rabbit hole in a desperate bid to court voters who are irretrievably, vehemently anti-Conservative. The Tory leader’s praise for the US administration’s DOGE, or Department of Government Efficiency, initiative in a new long-form podcast for the Daily Telegraph could well represent a further manifestation of this phenomenon.

Speaking to the Daily T, Badenoch backed a British version of Elon Musk’s DOGE and its slash-and-burn cost-cutting model. She said: “The policy commission work which we’re going to be carrying out is going to do lots of deep thinking about all of this.

“We have to do something like DOGE — probably won’t call it that. We have to have a revolution on this.”

According to a recent Ipsos survey, 63 per cent of Britons hold an unfavourable view of Musk — compared to 17 per cent who hold a favourable one. This reality, of course, will not be reflected in Badenoch’s X feed.

The Tory leader’s comments, if DOGE continues to be caught up in controversy, could represent a remarkable hostage to fortune. At the very least, it looks like a gamble to lavish praise — without a hint of caveat — on an unpopular tech billionaire spearheading a controversial scheme at the command of an unpopular president. (Three in five Britons, Ipsos note, hold an unfavourable view of Trump).

These conclusions beg further questions of Badenoch’s strategy as Conservative leader, with both insiders and outsiders noting her slow, buffering start. After all, Badenoch continues to be a big asset for her political opponents — all of them in fact, from Nigel Farage to Keir Starmer through to Ed Davey.

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‘What British industry needs and deserves is not a knee-jerk reaction, but a cool and clear-headed sense of the UK’s national interest based on a full assessment of all the implications of the US actions.’

—  Douglas Alexander, the trade minister, responds to an urgent question in the House of Commons about the US steel tariffs.

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Kemi Badenoch has backed a UK version of Elon Musk’s US government efficiency drive, DOGE, calling for a “revolution” in the public sector.

The Conservative leader revealed she is “looking very closely” at DOGE’s slash-and-burn cost-cutting model. Asked on the Daily T podcast if Britain needs a similar initiative, Badenoch responded: “I think so.”

She added: “If you remember in my campaign launch speech, I said that we need to reboot [and] rewire the state. This is what we have to do.

“And I’m looking very closely at what they are doing in DOGE.”

Tech billionaire Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency has been the cause of significant controversy in the United States as it has foraged the federal government for savings. Critics allege a lack of transparency and argue there are no discernible limits on Musk’s influence.

Musk, the world’s richest individual, has said he wants to cut at least two trillion US dollars, one third of the US federal government’s annual budget.

So far, DOGE employees have shown up at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Treasury Department, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, among other agencies.

Reflecting on how a national government can best lead an efficiency drive, Badenoch considered two possible approaches, including one advocated by Argentinian president Javier Milei. 

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She said: “You can try and make services more efficient, or you can just stop doing things, which is what they’ve done in Argentina, which is the ‘Afuera’ model, as I call it. I think that’s likely to be much more effective — where you have to think through and plan and work out, if we stop this, what’s going to happen? 

“Quite often, what happens is people make an announcement, we’re going to stop this, and then there’s all sorts of knock on effects, and they panic, and then they put it back, and you realise they don’t know what they’re doing. 

“The policy commission work which we’re going to be carrying out is going to do lots of deep thinking about all of this. We have to do something like DOGE — probably won’t call it that. We have to have a revolution on this, and we have to make sure that we get more people back into work, because that fixes a whole bunch of things. 

“It fixes immigration, where there’s pressure to bring in lots of people to do jobs that Brits don’t necessarily want to do or cannot do because they don’t have the skills. But it also means that we’re making more money and can support better run public services.”

Badenoch also began the Conservative Party’s expectations management ahead of the upcoming local elections on 1 May.

She said: “If people are not voting Conservative because they want to give us a kicking or they want to try their luck with Reform, then we’re going to see more and more Labour. 

“These are going to be extremely difficult local elections, not just because four years ago, we were at a high water mark, but because of the results in July 2024, if we had those results now, we will lose all but one council that we control. In fact, I think we might even lose that council if we repeated the July 2024 results. 

“So we need to compare where we are now from where we were in July 2024 and remind people that when you vote for a local council, you’re voting for who you want to run your school, your children’s education, to take your bins, look out after your parks, fix your roads, and it’s not about giving Conservatives a kicking.”

The Conservative leader also ruled out ever signing a pact with Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, saying the party’s manifesto promises “didn’t add up”.

Badenoch told the Daily T podcast: “I am the custodian of an institution that has existed for nigh on 200 years…I can’t just treat it like it’s a toy and have pacts and mergers.”

Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.

Politics.co.uk is the UK’s leading digital-only political website. Subscribe to our daily newsletter for all the latest news and analysis.

Source: Politics