Kemi Badenoch positioned herself as a modern-day Margaret Thatcher as she pledged to turn around Britain with a “common sense” approach.
Addressing the opening of the Conservative Party in Birmingham, the Tory leader said the Conservatives would “win the next election” as she unveiled a series of promises spanning welfare cuts, prison expansion and free childcare for higher-earning parents.
Trying to inject enthusiasm for a Thatcher-style turnaround for the party and country, she harked back to how the Iron Lady built support for the Conservatives in the late 1970s with a political treatise called “The Right Approach”.
She then unveiled her new essay “The Right Way” – a deliberate reflection of Baroness Thatcher’s vision 50 years ago.
She told party members in the hall: “When we win the next election, and we will, we are going to need to hit the ground running. We will need to be ready from day one having already shown people what kind of government we are going to be. And that is why today I have published The Right Way.
“In 1976, the Conservative Party published The Right Approach, a book which described what was going wrong in our economy and the right approach to fix it. We governed for 18 years after that, because we started with the right foundations. And we are going to do the same again.”
With the number of delegates seemingly down for the party conference this year, Ms Badenoch’s speech was met with only polite applause from her audience.
Ms Badenoch is not the first female Conservative leader to try to emulate Margaret Thatcher. Theresa May and Liz Truss both tried to follow in the footsteps of Britain’s first female prime minister but neither came close to achieving her success.
Earlier in the day, the Tory leader had described herself as the “no-nonsense mum” in contrast to prime minister Andy Burnham’s “cheesy uncle” – maintaining that the opposition has transformed following its record election defeat in 2024. It averages just 20 per cent in the polls, five points below where it was when she took over as leader.
She also rejected claims that cutting benefits and building prisons signalled a return to being the “nasty party”, stating: “It’s the common sense party. That’s what we’re doing.
“And, quite frankly, if we were doing so well the old way, then why did we have such a terrible issue in 2024?”
Speaking on the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme, she added: “I am a classic old-school Conservative. I believe in common sense: people working hard and being rewarded for that effort.”
While seeking to move past previous errors, Ms Badenoch stressed that core beliefs remain constant.
“The principles and the values never change,” she noted, adding: “Personal responsibility is not a 1980s idea.”
Asked to describe herself and Labour leader Mr Burnham after previously labelling Reform UK leader Nigel Farage a “grumpy grandpa”, she said: “Andy Burnham is the cheesy uncle. I think he’s the cheesy uncle who does all the dad jokes.
“And what am I? Someone else has to do that. It’s very difficult… They probably see me, you know, as the no-nonsense mum. No nonsense, [that’s] probably me.”
The annual party conference comes as the Conservatives attempt to construct a broader platform ahead of the next general election.
Proposals include removing the childcare “cliff edge” that currently excludes parents earning above £100,000 from state support.
Under the Tory plan, all parents working 16 hours or more weekly would receive 30 hours of free care. Estimated at £700m annually, officials say the measure would be funded by reducing civil service numbers at arms-length bodies.
Mrs Badenoch conceded individuals earning up to £1m would remain eligible, but insisted the measure targets those around the £100,000 threshold.
Additional proposals include restricting student loan access for non-UK nationals – a move projected to save £900m annually – and blocking EU Settled Status (EUSS) claims, which the party argues are being abused.
The Conservatives also promised 50,000 new prison places by cutting foreign aid to £1bn a year, aiming to stop early releases.
Over 14 years in power, the Conservatives delivered a net gain of roughly 500 prison places, taking into account 14,142 added spaces against 13,660 lost mainly to dilapidation.
Mrs Badenoch accused the Labour government of continuing early releases initiated under the Tories, charging them with releasing “dangerous” offenders and “papering over the cracks”.
She also hinted at cutting inheritance tax if fiscally responsible, calling it “morally right” in a Sunday Times interview.
And, despite uncertainty over the triple lock following doubts raised by senior figures including former chancellor Jeremy Hunt, shadow foreign secretary Tom Tugendhat, and shadow housing secretary Katie Lam, Mrs Badenoch insisted the party is “keeping” it.
Meanwhile, a major line of thought throughout Mrs Badenoch’s new political bible appears to be that government should not spread its resources too thinly, but should be strong in the areas in which “the state is required”: defence, borders, public order, the rule of law and essential infrastructure.
“There is always an emergency. There is always a good reason to spend government money or time on something, but we don’t have unlimited resources. Government is about making tough choices, deciding how you will spread your resources, what you are going to focus your time on,” Mrs Badenoch told the conference.
The document also acknowledges failures in the approach of previous Conservative governments to net zero, immigration and how Brexit was delivered.
Mrs Badenoch did receive one boost with polling carried out for the Blue Collar Conservative group showing that working-class voters backed her plans to slash taxes and spending.
The poll of 2,000 voters by the research agency Public First showed 49 per cent of less affluent, working-class voters want the Tories to improve the living standards of working-class families with an approach to “reduce taxes substantially on working people and businesses to encourage work, investment and job creation, even if this means significant cuts to government spending elsewhere”.
Meanwhile, in a direct challenge to Labour prime minister’s Andy Burnham’s tax and spend agenda, just 17 per cent of these working-class voters backed the option for the Tories to “keep taxes and government spending broadly around their current levels”.
Only 12 per cent wanted the party to “increase spending on public services and welfare benefits, even if this means higher taxes on working people and businesses”.
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