Kemi Badenoch’s supporters need to stop using Starmer as an excuse for her failure

Kemi Badenoch has been Tory leader for a year but she has failed to silence her critics, says political editor David Maddox

Keir Starmer being “useless” is now the biggest excuse used to explain why Kemi Badenoch has failed to charm the public.

The last Tory MPs still sticking by their leader believe the unprecedentedly rapid collapse in support for the Labour government is the main reason why their party is still desperately struggling in the polls.

The theory goes, as one MP put it, that had Sir Keir’s government had a normal start complete with political honeymoon and early competency, Ms Badenoch “would have had the time and space to do the work needed to turn the party around”.

“She has not been helped by the fact that Labour have proven to be so bad so quickly,” one shadow cabinet minister explained.

Kemi Badenoch speaking to the press (James Manning/PA) (PA Wire)

It is not the strongest of excuses for a struggling political leader and for every supporter there are many critics within the party who believe time is running out.

The facts are brutal. Since she became leader, a third of Tory voters have switched to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, who now regularly poll at 30 per cent or more.

Meanwhile, support for the Tories has in the last 12 months dropped by seven points, from an average of 24 per cent when she took over to 17 per cent now.

And if anything, that average may even be creeping down further to 16 per cent.

The parallel collapse in support for Labour has left a void in British politics currently being filled by Farage and Reform, with the Greens now also picking up the angry protest vote in recent weeks.

One poll this week had the Tories at joint fourth with Labour on 16 per cent.

What is clear is that voters have not been able to forgive the Tories since their disastrous end to government but appear even less convinced about them with Ms Badenoch in charge than they were a year ago.

While some, including Tory peer and pollster Robert Hayward, see green shoots of recovery in Ms Badenoch’s stronger recent performances at PMQs, and a well-received conference speech with eye-catching policies such as abolishing stamp duty, it is not showing in the polls.

“If the sum total of support for us with Kemi in charge is 16 or 17 per cent, then we are going nowhere,” said an ally of the man who many believe will replace her, Robert Jenrick. They described her as “the walking dead”.

This is why she is being given six months to turn things around, up until the next set of elections in May – but nobody is expecting anything other than terrible results in Wales, Scotland and English council elections.

Yet when you meet Ms Badenoch you do not meet someone who is at all cowed by this pressure or knocked off track by the backbiting criticism that has dogged her since the day after she was elected as leader.

Robert Jenrick is seen as a potential replacement for Kemi Badenoch (James Manning/PA) (PA Wire)

You meet a woman who is clear-minded, engaged and has a clear plan.

True, she was forced to abandon her idea of not having policies for two years to get some traction. But she is now focused on the economy on the basis that if – as many expect – something bad happens, she will have been the sane voice making the warnings and offering a plan.

However, the leak to The Spectator this week about how she went to the hairdressers on election day last year, instead of hitting the ground campaigning, underlines some of the criticisms about her. Critics call her lazy and difficult.

She has got rid of her chairman, Lord Dominic Johnson, and her chief of staff, Lee Rowley, among others, and there have been all sorts of stories of her rudeness and abrasiveness from former members of staff.

Most notably the well-liked James Roberts, formerly of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, was let go as her parliamentary manager – possibly because so many MPs were briefing against her.

There are claims she is having issues with her new chief of staff Henry Newman. Whether true or not, the problems with personal relationships are a recurring theme.

One new MP told The Independent they still had not been given a one-to-one meeting with her and had only had a brief conversation at a new MPs’ event.

Even her supporters do not sing her virtues, but say that “the party would look stupid ditching yet another leader”.

One MP said: “Our merry-go-round of leaders was a real problem on the doorstep in the general election.”

Much of this, though, is criticism from people who would like someone else in charge – mainly Robert Jenrick.

Those outside the party, including diplomats, see things becoming more positive for her.

If she can start getting voters back and see some sort of recovery in the polls – enough to prevent a total meltdown next May – then Ms Badenoch’s problems and the briefings against her will evaporate.

When she won she was dubbed the new Margaret Thatcher. The Iron Lady had time to turn things around in the 1970s without the febrile world of social media throwing a new spotlight on her every other second.

But Ms Badenoch needs to get on the front foot and start pulling back lost support from Reform. She and her supporters need to stop looking for strange excuses and realise that the collapse in confidence for Labour is actually an opportunity.

If she fails then she will not be the leader of the Tories at the next election.