Kemi Badenoch is the real deal, a tough cookie, and inspires. She will make an excellent Prime Minister
“He occasionally stumbled over the truth, but hastily picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened.”
Much has been made of Kemi Badenoch’s maiden speech in the House of Commons in 2017. I remember it well as I am someone who does like to listen to maiden speeches to find out who the likely rising stars are going to be. The following paragraph, in particular, made me stop what I was doing at the time:
“I believe in free markets and free trade. But there is more to conservatism than economic liberalism—there is respect for the rule of law; personal responsibility; freedom of speech and of association; and opportunity through meritocracy. Those freedoms are being subtly eroded in an era when emotion and feeling are prized above reason and logic. It is those freedoms that I will seek to defend during my time in this House.”
I felt at the time that she was someone who understands what it means to be a Conservative. Furthermore, she also understands what the necessary ingredients are in creating successful economies and why some economies fail.
This country is not reaping the rewards of Brexit. We have barely started. Too many think of Brexit as a destination; a terminus, when instead it is a junction where one alights and may travel in many different directions. This is the opportunity which Brexit gives us. Kemi understands that. Too few do.
She also understands that as individuals and families, we have to become more self-reliant. The Government cannot and should not do everything for us, and although we generally live in an epoch where big government reigns, the draconian restrictions during the Covid pandemic have made it worse. With Kemi as leader, this trend will be reversed - something all Conservatives should support. As she said in an article in The Times a week ago, “we need strong but limited government focused on the essentials.”
Although she was born in Wimbledon, she spent much of her younger years in Nigeria. As she has said, she chose the United Kingdom to be her home. She is a proud Brit. She rejects the divisive politics of critical race theory. She is, to coin the modern expression, anti-woke. She has ministerial experience and has succeeded in every role she has been appointed to. She has guts and determination. She will shake-up politics in this country, which after years of stagnation desperately needs shaking up, as Margaret Thatcher did in 1979 when she broke the post-war consensus.
To paraphrase the Churchill quote I opened with, the right of the Conservative Party occasionally stumbles across someone truly talented and inspirational, but for fear of taking a risk, it gets back up again as if nothing had happened. This is rather ironic as the Conservative Party is supposed to be the party which supports entrepreneurs and risk takers. Without risk we never advance as individuals and families, and as a nation. Kemi Badenoch is the real deal, a tough cookie, and inspires. She will make an excellent leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister. She is in many ways the epitome of the British dream. All we need to get her onto the members’ ballot is for Conservative MPs to take a calculated risk. I firmly believe that Kemi Badenoch is a risk worth taking. She would wipe the floor with Keir Starmer, take this country in a better direction, and secure a historic fifth term for the Conservative Party at the next general election, whenever that may be.