Anthony Seldon recently published the latest in his long and invaluable series of inside stories of premierships, Sunak at 10, and he gave it the subtitle “The last Conservative prime minister?” When the book was being planned in the early days of Kemi Badenoch’s leadership of the Conservative party, it did look as though the Tories might be finished as a party of government. But now Seldon, and his co-author Tom Egerton, aren’t so sure. Their book concludes: “At the time of writing in July 2026 … the Tory party still needs to engage in a process of deep self-reflection to understand why it failed in government, and tore itself so destructively apart, if it is ever to regain power.
But at this point in time we believe it is unlikely that Sunak will have been the last Tory prime minister.” That is a victory, of sorts, for Badenoch. For most of last year there were doubts that she would still be leader by the time of the next election. But she gave a successful party conference speech, her response to the budget was much admired, and her personal approval ratings with Tory members and right-leaning voters shot up.
After two years as opposition leader, Iain Duncan Smith was booted out. Two years in, Badenoch’s position as leader is safe and it is even conceivable that she could stay on if the Conservatives were to lose the next election (in part because any Tories who favour a radically different policy approach are being purged from the candidates list). But that does not mean Badenoch’s leadership is going well.
At the last election the Conservatives won 24.4% of the GB vote. According to the Politico poll of polls, they have been consistently polling below that since the end of 2024 and they are currently on 19%. The Conservative conference starts today and, explaining her strategy in an interview in the Times, Badenoch said: “Last year was about telling the party who I was.
Now the party is going to be showing the country who we are: a strong team of people who actually like each other.” The Tories have already announced quite a lot of conference-related policy. But she has not got the news space all to herself. It is the final day of the Green party’s conference in Brighton and this morning activists are expected to debate their ‘Zionism is racism’ motion.
The proposal has split the party, and critics claim that it is antisemitic. Whatever happens, it will affect how the Green party is seen. And this morning Labour has announced a major U-turn – abandoning most of the Keir Starmer/David Lammy plans to restrict access to jury trials.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
