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Tory Leadership Race Opens Up After Gaffes by Front-Runners
(Bloomberg) -- The contest to replace Rishi Sunak as UK opposition leader suddenly appears wide open, after the two candidates long seen as the front-runners picked the worst possible moment to have campaign stumbles.
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Both Robert Jenrick, the bookmakers’ favorite, and former Business Secretary Kemi Badenoch faced intense criticism for comments they made during the Conservative Party’s annual conference in Birmingham this week. The entire event is focused on candidates making their leadership pitches to grassroots Tories, who make the final decision in just one month’s time.
According to Conservative lawmakers and officials who spoke to Bloomberg on condition of anonymity, Badenoch’s gaffe over maternity pay and Jenrick’s on the behavior of Britain’s armed services have helped upend the contest. Former Home Secretary James Cleverly and even Tom Tugendhat, an outsider for weeks, now have plausible routes to victory, they said.
That view was bolstered by a YouGov poll of Tory members published Tuesday that suggested a run-off between Jenrick and either Badenoch or Cleverly would be too close to call. Tugendhat is behind, but officials point to his spirited appearances this week as potentially boosting his chances.
To be sure, party insiders still see Jenrick as the most likely to get through the two more ballots of MPs, before a final pair is put to the membership.
A former center-right politician who opposed Brexit in the 2016 referendum that still defines many of the ructions in British politics, Jenrick has reinvented himself as a right-wing choice by taking a hard line on crime and immigration. In campaign videos, he names foreigners who committed violent crimes, and calls for Britain to leave the European Convention on Human Rights.
In his speech Wednesday, Jenrick will make five pledges to change the party: rejecting mass migration; focusing on cheap energy; getting Britain building; a smaller state; and a more united country, his campaign said.
Jenrick holds significant support among MPs on the Tory right, and has a good chance of winning the backing of members who recent history suggested tend to pick the most right-wing option, the people said.
But a video in which Jenrick said British special forces are killing terrorists rather than capturing them to ensure they’re not protected by human rights laws, triggered a major backlash from rivals.
The comments risked putting soldiers at risk by making it less likely that enemy combatants would surrender, Tugendhat, a former soldier himself, told Sky News. Jenrick demonstrated a “fundamental misunderstanding” of the law of armed conflict, he said.
Still, the consequences for Jenrick’s campaign were likely limited by what been seen as a bad week for Badenoch’s campaign, the people said. The former Cabinet minister is also on the right of the party and has spent recent years intervening on so-called culture war issues. Yet her comment on Sunday that maternity pay in Britain was “excessive” was seen as a step too far by many.
Badenoch’s pugnacious style and willingness to get drawn into controversies may have put off some MPs worried about how she’d behave under the glare of leadership, one lawmaker said. Another described her campaign as blowing up over the remarks. A third said Badenoch needed a good week to cement her position among MPs, concluding that hadn’t happened.
In her speech to members, Badenoch will concede that on the Tories’ watch investors and businesspeople left the UK, telling members: “Wealth is not a dirty word.” She will criticize what she’ll say is an economic framework put in place by former Labour premiers Tony Blair and Gordon Brown that the Tories failed to “dismantle,” her office said.
Cleverly is seen as the main beneficiary of any drop in support for Badenoch. Tory lawmakers and officials said he was running what they called a submarine campaign, seeking to stay out of trouble, avoid mistakes or divisive policy announcements and refrain from publicly criticizing the other candidates. He was presenting himself as the most amiable contender and someone who could unite the party and win support in the country.
Cleverly was not hated by any party faction and could move past Badenoch to make the final run-off if he picked up votes from Tugendhat, the candidate furthest to the political left of the candidates who is seen as most likely to be eliminated in the next round of MP voting, the people said. He would set out a vision for “Conservatism with a smile” in his speech, telling delegates: “Let’s be enthusiastic; relatable; positive; optimistic,” according to his campaign.
Badenoch’s team insist her straight-talking style sets her apart from other identikit politicians. Three allies of the candidate also accused the Jenrick, Cleverly and Tugendhat campaigns of tacitly colluding to try to stop her from making the final pair. It was in all three men’s interests to undermine Badenoch because she is popular among party members, they said, pointing the finger at Jenrick’s campaign in particular.
Cleverly denied any collusion, telling Bloomberg Radio he would fire any member of his team caught briefing against his rivals.
Tugendhat, from the so-called One Nation caucus of party centrists, appeared to be enjoying his underdog status, Tory observers said. He was winning support among some members who didn’t want a right-wing leader, and would make a late bid to knock Cleverly out of the running at the next MP vote, they added.
In his speech, Tugendhat will pledge to make Tory members “proud” of their party again, and “champion principles and integrity after years of political games and petty politics,” his office said.
The contest has generated a buzz in Birmingham, with candidates walking through the venue accompanied by entourages of supporters and making ad-hoc stump speeches outside of their set-piece addresses on the main stage, due on Wednesday. The Tory mood at times has appeared better than at Labour’s own conference in Liverpool last week, where Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s warnings about looming tough economic choices soured the atmosphere.
Still, the upbeat vibe spoke more to delusion in the Conservative Party about its unpopularity and long road back to power, several Tory lawmakers said. None of the candidates were having the sort of conversation needed about how to reform public services and generate economic growth that were needed to make the party electable again, one official who is not aligned to any campaign said.
“What the Tories need is a leadership speech that jolts them out of their delusion: They are not on the brink of return to power but the start of a long, hard road of opposition,” said Theo Bertram, director at the Social Market Foundation think tank. “That road will be longer and harder if they convince themselves they only need to be more Tory.”
--With assistance from Lizzy Burden and James Woolcock.
(Updates with quotes from candidates’ speeches throughout.)
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