Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has delivered her keynote address to Tory members at their party conference in Birmingham, promising tax cuts and a clear political ideology underpinning her policy platform.
Here the Press Association lists the key points from Mrs Badenoch’s speech.
– Inheritance tax
The Conservative leader left her big announcement for the end of her speech, telling Tory members that she planned to change the law so that no-one pays inheritance tax on their family home.
In another step aimed at protecting families’ assets, the Tory leader said couples would be able to leave an additional £1 million tax free to their families.
Together the changes mean that the number of families paying death duties will fall by half, Mrs Badenoch said.
– The Battle with Labour
The Conservative leader framed the next election as a “battle for the soul of this nation, a battle of ideas”.
Labour wants to tax and spend, she said, and warned: “Your taxes will be higher. Your bills will go up. You will find it harder and harder to make ends meet”.
The Tories meanwhile are “fighting again for the belief that what people earn belongs to them”.
– Reform UK
She also hit out at the “circular firing squad” of Reform UK, and urged voters who had left the Tories to back Nigel Farage’s political outfit to come back.
Reform voters deserve better, she said, adding: “Many of them are our people. We let them down and we want them to come back home.”
– Mistakes of the past
The Tories are a “no drama party” now she said, adding that the “plots and infighting” of the previous government are gone.
“We are the no nonsense party,” the Conservative leader added.
She later compared the Tories to the retailer M&S, as she suggested the party had undergone a rebrand after once being perceived as “stuffy”.
“Just like M&S we must learn from our mistakes, win back trust, and make people feel good about our party again,” she added.
– Race and identity
Mrs Badenoch hit out at suggestions by Reform UK’s Suella Braverman that non-white people brought up in England cannot be considered English.
She said: “We must not let these people take us backwards. That is not the country we are.
“Reform MPs are openly questioning people’s identity. They are not like us, we are not like them.”
– Antisemitism and the Green Party
The Green Party meanwhile came under fire for its party conference vote to endorse the position that Zionism is Racism.
Mrs Badenoch described the motion as “disgraceful antisemitism”, and on the third anniversary of the October 7 attacks insisted the Conservatives would stand with the Jewish people.
– The national debt
The country is “running out of money and running out of time” to fix its problems, as the world becomes more dangerous and Western economies become “more fragile”, Mrs Badenoch said, as she turned towards her proposals to solve Britain’s challenges.
The national debt is the source of all of Britain’s problems, she suggested.
– Economic growth
The Tory leader urged the Government to “stop faffing about” and build the third runway at Heathrow Airport, and called for a swathe of planning and tax red tape, including the Aarhus Convention, to be axed to stimulate growth.
She also defended plans to continue drilling for fossil fuels in the North Sea to sustain Aberdeen’s economy.
– Restraints on business
Mrs Badenoch promised to scrap “every job-killing measure” in Labour’s Employment Rights Act, and to cut the “jobs tax” of employer National Insurance Contributions, as a means of easing pressure on businesses and making it easier to hire young people.
– Welfare
On welfare, she spoke of the Tories’ plans for a pre-paid Back to Work card, which would prevent benefits claimants from using their payments to buy alcohol and cigarettes, and from gambling, while allowing them to purchase essentials.
She also spoke about the Tories plans for a “Get to Work” programme, which would place young people straight out of school or university into work, rather than on out-of-work benefits.
– Defence
On defence, she insisted the Tories had a plan worked out for how to raise defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030.
“If we want peace we must prepare for war,” Mrs Badenoch said, suggesting her party’s plans for a “Britannia Shield” missile defence system was an example of how the Conservatives were ready.
– More prison places
The Tory leader promised to build 50,000 extra prison places if her party returns to power.
She hit out at the early prison release scheme, and said the unrest earlier this year in Middlesbrough – which led to the deaths of two police officers – was a result of “a collapse in consequences” for criminals.
“We need to make sure that criminals face the full force of the law,” Mrs Badenoch said.
– Public sector workers are ‘not the enemy’
Public sector workers are not the enemy, Mrs Badenoch said. “There are real jobs in the public sector adding value to society,” she insisted, and said doctors, teachers and soldiers were among those who had been let down by a system which “tries to stop them using their common sense”.
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