Deep blue Badenoch faces multiple challenges as Tory leader
The Guardian Weekly|November 08, 2024
Kemi Badenoch might have avoided the cursed 52%-48% ratio that has riven the Conservative party before, but the nevertheless close-run nature of her 56.5% tally in the members' vote for the party's new leader shows the scale of the task before her.
Peter Walker
Deep blue Badenoch faces multiple challenges as Tory leader

It is hard to overstate the challenges Rishi Sunak's successor faces, even setting aside the muchcited fact that the last new UK leader to take a party directly from an election defeat to government was Margaret Thatcher in 1979.

To begin with, as Badenoch acknowledged in her victory speech, which came with a warning that Tories must "tell the truth" to win back the trust of the voting public, opposition is just as difficult, especially after so long in government.

There is a sense that quite a number of the 121 remaining Conservative MPs are still only just getting used to the sparse opposition benches and limited number of select committee places.

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