Britain's Conservatives elect Kemi Badenoch as their party's new leader: NPR

British MP Kemi Badenoch speaks after being elected as the new leader of the opposition Conservative Party in London on Saturday.

Alberto Pezzali/AP

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Alberto Pezzali/AP

LONDON – Britain's Conservative Party elected Kemi Badenoch as its new leader on Saturday as it tries to recover from a crushing election defeat that ended 14 years in power.

Badenoch (pronounced BADE-enock), the first black woman to lead a major British political party, defeated rival lawmaker Robert Jenrick in a vote of nearly 100,000 members of the right-wing Conservatives.

She received 53,806 votes in online and postal voting by party members, to Jenrick's 41,388.

Badenoch replaces former prime minister Rishi Sunak, who led the Conservatives to their worst election result since 1832 in July. The Conservatives lost more than 200 seats, falling to 121 seats.

The new leader's daunting task is to try to restore the party's reputation after years of division, scandal and economic turmoil, condemn Labor Prime Minister Keir Starmer's policies on key issues such as the economy and immigration, and support the Conservatives in the to return to power in the next elections. due by 2029.

“The task before us is hard but simple,” Badenoch said in a victory speech to a room full of Conservative lawmakers, staffers and journalists in London. She said the party's job was to hold the Labor government to account and develop commitments and a plan for government.

Addressing the party's election defeat, she said: “We have to be honest – honest about the fact that we have made mistakes, honest about the fact that we have neglected standards.”

“It is time to tell the truth, stand up for our principles, plan for our future, reshape our politics and our thinking and give our party and our country the fresh start they deserve,” Badenoch said .

Badenoch, business secretary in Sunak's government, was born in London to Nigerian parents and spent much of her childhood in the West African country.

The 44-year-old former software engineer portrays herself as a disruptor, advocating for a low-tax, free-market economy and promising to “rewire, reboot and reprogram” the British state.

A critic of multiculturalism and a self-proclaimed enemy of the woke, Badenoch has criticized gender-neutral bathrooms and government plans to reduce carbon emissions in the UK. During the leadership campaign she was criticized for saying that “not all cultures are equally valid” and that maternity pay was too high.

Tim Bale, professor of politics at Queen Mary University of London, said the Conservative Party was likely to “move to the right in both its economic and social policies” under Badenoch.

He predicted that Badenoch would “pursue what you might call the boats, boilers and bathrooms strategy… focusing very heavily on the transgender issue, the immigration issue and skepticism about progress towards net zero. “

While the Conservative Party does not represent the country as a whole – its 132,000 members are largely wealthy, older white men – its upper ranks have become significantly more diverse.

Badenoch is the third female leader of the Tories after Margaret Thatcher and Liz Truss, who both became prime ministers. She is the second Conservative leader with a non-white background after Sunak and the first with African roots. In contrast, the centre-left Labor Party has always been led only by white men.

In a leadership contest that lasted more than three months, Conservative lawmakers whittled down the field of six candidates in a series of votes before leaving the final two to the broader party membership.

Both finalists came from the right of the party and argued they could win back voters from Reform UK, the far-right, anti-immigrant party led by populist politician Nigel Farage that has eaten up Conservative support.

But the party also lost many voters to the victorious Labor Party and the centrist Liberal Democrats, and some conservatives fear a rightward turn will alienate the party from public opinion.

The first few months of its term in office have been difficult for Starmer's government, marked by negative headlines, bleak finances and falling approval ratings.

But Bale said the historical record suggests the chances of Badenoch leading the Conservatives back to power in 2029 are slim.

“It's quite unusual for someone to take power when a party is being beaten very badly and manage to lead them to victory,” he said. “But Keir Starmer did exactly that after 2019. So records are there to be broken.”