Leadership elections, especially ones of this length, often descend into party infighting. 2016 and 2022 stand out as being elections which particularly drew the party into embarrassment. It is to the great credit of Robert Jenrick and Kemi Badenoch that the party has remained dignified and courteous as the Tories prepare to remake the case for government.
The need for unity, however, is not confined to the rhetoric of the leadership race. The Conservative parliamentary party, we must be honest, has woeful form when it comes to sincerely rallying behind the leader the membership chooses. Theresa May was the most recent Premier to enjoy a good-faith clean start as leader.
Each of the others faced concerted internal opposition, some of it very public, sapping their authority as leader. Plots, cliques and hostile briefings from MPs unwilling to reconcile themselves to the leader the party membership chose.
We must also own up, that we as the public and the media have our own sins to atone for. Rishi Sunak, now the dust has settled, had an eminently sensible manifesto, a respectable record in government. Voters are already envious of the calm and competence of his government in contrast to the amateurish student politics of the new government.
But perhaps we wouldn’t be in opposition at all if, from January onwards, Sunak wasn’t faced with pernicious calls to resign from across the party.
His ill-fated election was, in large part, spurred on by the widespread dissent which, like for his predecessors, had been cannibalising his government since he first entered number 10.
The single most important judgement for the party members to make is who can lead the party and bring the doubters with them. Those in Parliament and those who knock on doors and those who write in these columns. One look at the breadth and quality of endorsements show undoubtedly that Kemi is that leader.
It’s not simply a case of counting up those business leaders, politicians past and present, who vouch that she understands both the economic and social maladies the nation faces. It’s that each seems to speak to a different aspect of her leadership.
Many MPs focus on how she can win new voters, not just the ones we lost in the summer. Others praise her sure-footedness in defending conservatism against the woke, almost singlehandedly turning her Ministry of Women and Equalities into one of the most impactful parts of government.
Business rejoices over her focus, backed up in her time as Business and Trade Secretary, on squeezing the grip of quangos, regulators and consultants bleeding business and preventing investment and growth.
One gets with Kemi a leader who has the cerebral and deliberative ability to understand those long term threats including mass immigration, rising wokeism, activist judges and de-growthers while also having the guts to argue. In every area where sensible Conservatism is desperate to make itself heard, we find Kemi the coolest and most capable advocate for it.
Her rise through the party speaks to it – she’s a formidable debater. That’s why many more back her for her ability to show up Starmer’s totally contrasting lack of substance.
It is this breadth of offering that is her key strength, and which drives her support from such wide circles. Advancing conservatism in each of the largest political issues, and doing so culturally, intellectually, politically and rhetorically, is what makes her the only person who can lead a party which constantly pulls in different directions.
For the first time in a while, the party will be able to welcome a new leader in good faith, without a clique or personality cult behind them. Helping her will be the fact that Jenrick’s very good campaign has focused on the same issues of growth, culture and immigration.
Starmer is driving the country into the dust. Kemi is the leader to sculpt that growing but segmented consensus, that conviction that we can do better, into a compelling and united case to be in government again.
