Kemi Badenoch's confounding decision to copy the David Miliband playbook
For the fifth time in nine years, the Conservative Party is to elect a new leader. Consequently, this year's conference in Birmingham has been widely described as a "beauty parade", as the four remaining candidates make their case to party members.
But there's a wrinkle. Only the top two candidates will go forward to the ballot of ordinary members. Until then, it is the votes of Tory MPs that matter. Something only three of the four contenders appear to have fully assimilated.
Robert Jenrick, the newly-crowned darling of the anti-immigration right, is sweeping up the votes of those who believe the road back to Downing Street involves cannibalising Reform UK. Think stricter border measures and leaving the European Convention on Human Rights.
Next are the two candidates of the centre, James Cleverly and Tom Tugendhat, competing for the votes of One Nation MPs. Only one of them can make it, but the lane is theirs to fight it out.
And then there is Kemi Badenoch. The shadow housing secretary has long enjoyed her status as favourite of the grassroots. Yet she appears intent on alienating her colleagues. In the last couple of days alone, Badenoch has suggested that "not all cultures are equally valid" and has been firefighting since giving an interview toTimes Radioin which she appeared to say that maternity leave was placing too great a burden on businesses .
These comments may go down well with ordinary party members. Indeed, a YouGov poll last month had Badenoch leading on 24 per cent , and winning in a head-to-head against every other candidate. But scarcely matters how well Badenoch performs among members if she never actually gets to face them.The electorate right now is Conservative MPs looking for a leader who will listen to their concerns and help them keep their seats. It is easy to mock Jenrick's recent conversion to the right of the Tory Party, but it is difficult to fault a winning strategy.
Badenoch increasingly reminds me of David Miliband's famously successful 2010 Labour leadership campaign. The elder Miliband won with party members and MPs, but lost decisively amongst the trade unions, handing victory to his brother on the tightest of margins. But given the outsized vote of Labour MPs back then, if Miliband had been just a little more accommodating of his colleagues, he would have won. And history may – or may not – have turned out differently.
