‘Not words that I would have used’: Stride distances himself from Jenrick’s ‘no white faces’ comments – as it happened

Michael Heseltine, the former deputy prime minister, was often the star performer at Conservative party conferences in the 1980s and 1990s. Now he is estranged from the Tory leadership (he hated Brexit), and he’s 92, but he was at conference today giving a speech at European Movement fringe.

Heseltine said he wanted to see the election of another Tory government. But he criticised two of the biggest policy announcements at the conference.

On leaving the European convention on human rights, he said:

In one of his most famous speeches Winston Churchill at Zurich in 1946 called for a Council of Europe and a Charter of Human Rights. This country was the first to ratify the Charter before it came into force in 1953. It was the first legally binding international human rights treaty.

The court itself came into existence in 1959 with the British Lord McNair as its first President. The UK has had a British judge ever since as one of the 46 judges representing the 46 signatories. In the event that a case is brought concerning the UK that British judge will be involved in the proceedings.

If any changes are required, the worst thing is to walk out and turn our back on one of the most civilised of European creations. The right way is to follow David Cameron’s example and seek change by agreement as he did in 2012 with the Brighton Declaration. It is more than possible that the widespread concerns about asylum seekers across Europe would make review welcome to many signatories.

And on repealing the Climate Change Act, he said:

The threat from global warming must not be ignored in the hope that it may not happen or because there is a backlash against the cost. The Climate Change Act 2008 was prepared by the conservative opposition led by David Cameron. So comprehensive was the parliamentary support that Gordon Brown agreed to accept it as a government bill which was passed with only five dissenting votes. The act set up the Climate Change Committee. This committee has been supported by our party and indeed on its recommendation we passed into law the Net Zero target by 2050. We should be proud of our role in the battle to halt climate change. It was Margaret Thatcher who gave one of the starkest and earliest warnings of the dangers. Today the evidence in storms, coastal erosion, flooding, fire and the spread of desert is all too clear. It would be an act of unforgivable irresponsibility to undo all that Conservatives have done to play a leading role in this world threatening crisis.

Heseltine also condemned the demonisation of asylum seekers.

The overwhelming majority of asylum seekers want to share in our standards, and to escape from persecution or civil war. To describe them as thieves or rapists is not just dishonest but encourages the worst sort of prejudice in our communities. If you want further proof just visit any part of our health services, social services, public or private sector offices or academia.

James Cleverly, the shadow housing secretary, has confirmed that he is thinking about standing as the Tory candidate for London mayor in 2028.

In an interview with Adam Fleming for the BBC’s Newscast podcast, Cleverly said he was primarily committed to his constituency in Essex (Braintree), but admitted that he was attracted by the prospect of the London job.

Asked if he fancied being London mayor, Cleverly replied:

 The mayor of big cities like London is an incredibly important job.

We’ve already discussed the huge difference that Andy Street made to Birmingham and the West Midlands.

Look, I love being the mayor for Braintree [ie, MP for Braintree]. I’ve had so many people say, you, you cut your teeth in London politics. It’s a really, really important job.

My heart is in Essex, but I also know watching London go wrong angers me enormously.

When Fleming said that answer made it sound as if he was interested in the job, Cleverly replied:

Look I’d be stupid not to think about it, but I say my heart, my heart’s in Essex.

Cleverly first held elected office as a member of the London assembly.

There has been speculation about Cleverly trying to get the Tory nomination for the election, which will be in 2028, for some time and yesterday he revived it with a conference speech that included a long passage attacking Sadiq Khan’s record on housing in the capital.

With Khan widely expected to stand down in 2028, and Labour very unpopular nationally, there is a speculation that a mainstream/liberal Conservative like Cleverly could do well in the election. Boris Johnson was elected mayor of London in 2008 on a similar platform.

The full interview will be available around 7pm tonight.

UPDATE: A reader points out that Khan gave an interview before the Labour conference saying that he would stand for a fourth term. Sorry; I was wrong to say earlier that Khan would definitely be standing down in 2028. But I’m told that when Khan gave that answer, he did not want to say he would be standing down in case that triggered headlines about his intending to challenge Keir Starmer etc (Andy Burnham was making headlines at the time), and there is still an expectation that he will call it a day after three terms. I’ve amended the wording in the post above.

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has said that Robert Jenrick’s speech shows that the Conservatives want “puppet judges” and are no longer a party supporting the rule of law. He posted this on social media.

We have an independent judiciary in this country. Robert Jenrick wants puppet judges.

The Conservative Party once believed in the rule of law and our shared British values - no longer.

Sundus Abdi is a Guardian reporter.

Ayoub Khan, the independent MP who represents Handsworth, has accused Robert Jenrick of making “dangerous” and “divisive” comments about integration.

Speaking from Soho Road in Handsworth, Khan told BirminghamLive:

To suggest integration is about the colour of your skin is not only disingenuous – it’s dangerous, it’s divisive.

He said Jenrick “got nothing right” about the area, adding that the shadow justice secretary had only spent “about nine minutes” in Handsworth earlier this year, during a visit focused on rubbish and fly tipping.

Khan, whose Birmingham Perry Barr constituency covers Handsworth, added: “We know we’ve had bin strikes, we know workers are not getting their fair share and having to take losses of £8,000 on average.”

Khan also criticised Tory leader Kemi Badenoch for supporting Jenrick’s comments, saying she “should have taken a very different view”. He added:

When you bring race into a discussion, you are fuelling hatred and division.We have seen incidents where hate crime has increased and people like Robert Jenrick, and his comments, are not welcome.

Mel Stride, the shadow chancellor, has said that he would not have used the words that Robert Jenrick did about not seeing “another white face” when he talked about visiting Handsworth in Birmingham.

Stride is the first senior Tory at the conference to distance himself from Jenrick over the comments, which Kemi Badenoch has been defending all today.

At a Politico fringe meeting, asked by Anne McElvoy how he felt about Jenrick’s comments, Stride replied:

Those are not words that I would have used.

Having said that, everybody chooses their own words. It’s now being asked, does the fact that he said that make him a racist? No, I don’t believe it does at all.

But I think everybody chooses their own words. And I’ll be frank and say they are not words that I would have chosen.

Laura Trott, the shadow education secretary, proposed a zero tolerance approach to violence in schools in her speech to the conference this morning. This would involve a presumption that pupils who bring a knife to school should be permanently excluded.

She explained:

We can’t shy away from setting clear boundaries, for excluding pupils when they have been extremely violent or are carrying a knife.

This is not about giving up on those children. It is actually the opposite.

Children must learn that actions have consequences. That is just how the world works.

So, under the Conservatives, our policy is simple: one knife and you are out.

If you assault a teacher then you are out.

If you sexually assault someone then you are out.

If you’ve been expelled from not just one but two mainstream schools, then it’s clear, mainstream classrooms aren’t for you.

If children bring knives into the classroom, then they shouldn’t be there.

If they are violent, then they shouldn’t be there.

And under the Conservatives, they won’t be there.

James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, used his speech to the Tory conference to accuse Nigel Farage of anti-Nato.

He said:

There are those who claim that Nigel Farage’s party are the true conservatives, but let us remind ourselves what happened when Putin launched his all-out invasion.

On that day, what did Farage do? Whose side was he on as our continent was suddenly threatened with war for the first time since 1945? That day, he chose to blame Nato for provoking Putin.

What did we do that day? Instead of blaming our closest allies, we took real action to defend freedom by arming the Ukrainians at lightning speed.

NLAW anti-tank weapons, half a million artillery shells, the first government to provide main battle tanks and Storm Shadow missiles, and by training 50,000 Ukrainian soldiers.

This is what it means to be a true conservative – standing up to Putin, just like Churchill did to Hitler, Thatcher to Galtieri and in this party, we will always stand up for freedom and be prepared to defend it.

Lord Sumption, a former supreme court judge, told the World at One that Robert Jenrick’s proposal to change the judicial appointments process so that the lord chancellor (the justice secretary) appoints judges would be a “serious mistake”.

Sumption said that, before 2005, the lord chancellor did appoint judges. But opinion was “much less polarised” then, he said. He said the only Marxist to sit on the high court bench was appointed by Lord Hailsham, a Conservative. He went on:

If judges were appointed in today’s polarised world by the lord chancellor, I do not think the public would have the same confidence in their independence. They’re actually appointed by the judicial appointments commission, which is an independent, non-political body, and it looks for the same qualities in the judges it appoints.

The only possible reason for going back to the old system would be to appoint judges who were less independent or more political than the ones appointed by the judicial appointments commission.

Sumption said the Jenrick policy would bring the UK closer to the US model, where the president appoints judges to the supreme court. He went on:

In the United States, the supreme court has become subservient to the president and enabled him to behave like an autocrat. I think that that is a very serious business in the United States, and we should be very careful to take take warning from it.

Sumption also said he did not think it was objectionable for part-time judges to give free legal services to bodies like migration charities. Making public statements that were politically controversial was a form of misconduct, he said. But he said there were already procedures in place to deal with that. The system “works perfectly well”, he said.

He went on:

Judges have got to be independent of the government and independent of political sentiment. I entirely agree with that. But they can’t be independent if they’re liable to denounced by politicians. I think that that is a serious mistake. It’s a misjudgment on his part.

It is particularly awkward for the Tories to have Lord Sumption criticising Jenrick on this because Sumption is one of the most prominent British judges advocating withdrawal from the European convention on human rights. His comments featured prominently in the Lord Wolfson report on this issue.

A journalist asks Jenrick why he did not mention Reform UK in his speech.

Jenrick replies:

Because I don’t obsess about them.

This was popular with the audience at the fringe meeting (though clearly disingenous – see 1.01am.)

Zack Polanski, the Green party leader, has denounced Robert Jenrick’s Handsworth comments as racist. In a post on social media he said:

Jenrick could have visited Handsworth to listen to residents – he chose to pass through and make a judgement based on the colour of their skin. Instead of getting to know our nation of neighbours, he chose racism.

The Tories, Reform and Labour want to divide us.

The Greens say enough is enough.

David Lammy, the deputy PM and justice secretary, has accused Robert Jenrick of threatening judicial independence, “the cornerstone of democracy”. In a statement issued in response to Jenrick’s speech, Lammy said:

Robert Jenrick calls himself a patriot, but he tramples on the British values he claims to defend. He calls himself a Conservative, but he threatens to trash the institutions and traditions that hold our country together.

The independence of judges from politicians is not optional. It is the cornerstone of British democracy. When politicians start deciding which judges can stay or go, that is democratic backsliding and Robert Jenrick knows it.

Unlike Robert Jenrick, the public knows Britishness isn’t about retreating into suspicion or judging people by the colour of their skin. It’s about pride in what we build and contribute together. While the Conservative party feeds off division and decline, Labour is delivering the patriotic renewal our country needs.

That was obviously a leader’s speech, or the speech of a prospective leader, but to describe it as Robert Jenrick making his pitch to replace Kemi Badenoch at some point in the next does not really do justice to the significance of what has just happened at the Conservative party conference. After being more or less comatose for 48 hours, Jenrick has just jolted it awake.

Three aspects stand out.

First, there was menace in the speech that went well beyond anything a Tory conference has heard from someone likely to be a party leader (although Suella Bravemen came close). Conference speeches normally include criticism of opponents. But what Jenrick said about Keir Starmer was unusually strong (see 12.04am), and what he said about Lord Hermer, whom he accused in effect of being a traitor to the country and a “mafia lawyer”, was probably actionable. But, even more significant, was his attack on activist laywers, which is pure McCarthyism (or Trumpism, which is even worse). (See 12.13pm.)

Second, as a leader’s speech, this was not just about pitching to be leader of the Conservative party. This was chock-full of Farage rhetoric – people at breaking point, the old order about to collapse, a new future on the horizon etc. A lot of this is just rhetorical hogwash, but people like this sort of stuff and Jenrick delivered it well. Kemi Badenoch has spent all week dismissing the threat from Reform UK on the grounds that Nigel Farage is proposing higher welfare spending (which isn’t even true). Jenrick is adopting an entirely different approach; camp on their territory, and appropriate their vision.

Third, regardless of what you think of the content, this was a very, well-crafted speech, far better than anything from anyone else at this conference. That does not necessarily mean it will be persuasive. But it is the sort of speech you would expect from someone who is very, very, very serious about becoming a leader. Badenoch should be worried.

In his spirit of Britain passage, Jenrick also cited the people he met at the protest outside the asylum hotel in Epping.

As I’ve been visiting communities, I’ve asked a lot of questions, and I’m telling you, out there, the spirit is strong.

I felt it when I went to Epping and stood with mums, local mums, sick of illegal migration and determined to keep their family safe.

I felt it when I went out with tradesmen, gas fitters like my dad, sick of their livelihoods being wrecked when scumbags break into their vans and nick their tools and sell them in plain sight to the local car boot sale.

I felt it when I talked to folk putting up flags, sick of their identity being sneered at.

The collapse of the old order is in sight. A new one is coming because the British people are fighting back.

And there’s absolutely nothing that Labour can do to stop it.

The only choice we have is whether we have the spirit to fight with them.

Are we going to quit when the going gets tough? Are we going to dig deep and fight like never before? How long will our battle last? As long as it takes, because Britain, for all its present flaws, is too precious to lose.

Let me not see our country’s honour fade. Let us see our land retain her soul, her pride, her freedom.

Conference, every tide turns. I can feel Britain’s fortunes turning.

So let’s pick ourselves, let’s dust ourselves down, let’s draw on Britain’s greatness to make it greater still.

Let’s fight for a better future. Let’s build this new order. Let’s take our country back.

Jenrick is now branching out into a more general ‘broken Britain’ argument.

He says people in the country are fed up – fed up with shoplifting, with antisocial behaviour, with the police ignoring proper crime and focusing on social media.

He goes on:

Dismissed, derided, demeaned for so long, the British people are patient and they are tolerant, but only up to a point. They’ve had enough.

Now I’ve read countless stories about how talented young people are abandoning the UK. They’re emigrating to Dubai or Singapore or Australia, and not just because of the weather.

Conference. This is my message to you. We may be a little bit down, but our country is not out, because there is a better way.

There is so much good in our country that’s worth fighting for. We’ve got so much to cherish about who we are …

A love of pubs, our love of animals, the common law, jury trials, a royal family so admired that they make the most powerful man in the world go weak at the knees, a military that has defeated every force on the planet, the roar of the crowd at Twickenham as the Red Roses beat the Canadians or Chris Woakes, arm in a sling goes out to bat at The Oval, the quiet kindness of our hospice movement, the millions of volunteers whose helping hands and broad shoulders make our society strong, the spirit of builders, of makers, of doers, of givers – these are the reasons our hearts swell when we think of Britain.

Jenrick says his audience will be wondering who the fourth Tory blonde is.

It is not Boris Johnson or Margaret Thatcher. It is Michael Hestline, he says.

He says, although he disagrees with Heseltine on many things, there is one aspect of his charcter he admires.

[Heseltine said] when he was a young man in opposition, back in the 1970s under Margaret Thatcher, he would wake up every morning and he’d ask his wife, how am I going to fight, fight, fight Labour today?

And at the end of the day, he would lie in bed again, and he would ask his wife – well, he obviously wasn’t a very romantic man – tomorrow, how am I going to fight, fight, fight Labour.

Jenrick takes out a prop – a judge’s wig.

He says this is meant to symbolise the fact that judges are unbiased.

But he says he has discovered there are many judges who are not unbiased.

Today, I’ve uncovered dozens of judges with links to open borders charities who take to social media to broadcast their open borders views, who spent their whole careers fighting to keep illegal migrants in this country.

Some even continue to do so, whilst, astonishingly, serving as judges.

It’s like finding out halfway through a football match that the ref is actually a season ticket holder for the other side.

The public rightly ask how independent are they. They dishonour generations of independent jurists who came before them, and they undermine the people’s trust in the law itself. Judges who blur the line between adjudication and activism can have no place in our justice system.

And Jenrick is now attacking Starmer’s friend and attorney general, Lord Hermer.

He says:

Like one of those infamous mafia lawyers of yesteryear, Hermer always chose a particular type of client, Shamima Begum, Osama bin Laden’s right-hand man, terrorists involved in 7/7.

Since taking office, the advice we’re told Lord Hermer has given to Starmer and his cronies, like to give away the Chagos islands to an ally of China, and to pay billions of pounds for the privilege.

In each and every one of these incidents, he’s wasted no time establishing himself as a useful idiot for our enemies.

His rise symbolises the central truth of Keir Starmer’s government – Labour is just not on Britain’s side.

Jenrick says one of Hermer’s clients was Gerry Adams. But the IRA tried to blow up the cabinet table – the same one Hermer now sits round.

UPDATE: Jenrick also said:

Why on earth, why on earth would Britain’s attorney general change the law to enable our country’s enemies to sue the very government he represents?

Well, it makes more sense when you realise another of Lord Hemer’s old clients was, you guessed it, Gerry Adams. Gerry Adams.

Not long ago, a man with his past would have had no place in mainstream politics.

Now he sits at the cabinet table, and he influences decisions about our country. The same cabinet table the IRA, tried to blow up in 1991.

Shame on him and shame on the man who appointed him.

Robert Jenrick is speaking to the conference now.

He is speaking as shadow justice secretary, but he is also widely seen as a probable party leader before the next election given the widespread assumption that Kemi Badenoch will be replaced.

Jenrick says he wants to talk about four famous blondes.

He starts by mentioning – Michael Fabricant – probably not the person they were expecting. Fabricant entered the Big Brother House, but only lasted four days.

Then there was Emily Hewertson – but she only lasted four hours.

Jenrick says he has heard a third blonde is negotiating with Big Brother. But talks have broken down because Liz Truss wants to be paid by the minute, he says.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, says 20 Tory councillors have defected to his party. There have been a series of announcements all morning.

He says:

This morning we announced that 20 Conservative Councillors have defected to Reform UK.

The Conservative Party is finished.

Here are more lines from Chris Philp’s speech to the conference this morning.

• Philp, the shadow home secretary said the Tories would allow the police to stop and search people without needing grounds for suspicion in crime hotspot areas. He said:

It’s insane that the smell of cannabis alone, or somebody wearing a menacing mask alone, does not generally allow, legally, a stop and search.

Now in my view, a single suspicion indicator should be enough.

So, in our hotspot areas, we will allow routine stop and search without suspicion. Anyone can be searched.

We will change the law to do this, and we will triple the use of stop and search.

• He said a Tory government would deliver “sustained negative net migration” by setting a binding annual cap on immigration, voted on by parliament.

• He said the Tories would abolish non-crime hate incidents if they won the next general election.

It is time to end the madness of police showing up on someone’s doorstep because they have offended someone online – the police should catch real criminals, not off-colour tweets.

Policing non-criminal social media posts is a catastrophic waste of time, and it tramples on free speech.

In government, we would end this nonsense, and we will abolish non-crime hate incidents. So you can tweet away!

• He said the Tories would scrap the anti-racism commitment plan published by the College of Policing and the Police Chiefs’ Council, branding it “absurd”.

What I’ve got to tell you now will shock you.

There is a so-called anti-racism commitment plan published by the College of Policing and the Police Chiefs’ Council that literally says policing should not be colour blind. Let me be clear, yes, it should!

Treating racial groups differently to engineer the same arrest rate, even if the offending rates are different, is immoral, plain wrong. People should stand equal before the law. It is that simple.

Woke nonsense in policing has to end and, as home secretary, I will scrap that absurd document.

• He said under the Tories people who express racial or religious hatred, or support for terrorism, would be removed from the country if they are not British citizens.

Rowena Mason is the Guardian’s Whitehall editor.

More than a dozen Conservative councillors have defected to Reform today, with the party dripping out announcements every half hour or so since 7am.

They include Robbie Lammas, a former chief of staff to Tory MP and
shadow cabinet minister Richard Holden. The Medway councillor said:

The Conservative party is over. Only Reform can deliver the change Britain needs.

Another defector is Denise Howard, a former ITV producer and press officer for the Conservatives, who has now switched to Reform as a councillor for East Riding of Yorkshire.

There has been no big defection of any MPs or prominent former MPs, though, which will have Kemi Badenoch breathing a sigh of relief given persistent rumours that Jacob Rees-Mogg, Andrew Rosindell or Suella Braverman could be about to jump ship.

In her interview on the Today programme this morning Kemi Badenoch accepted that, if the UK leaves the European convention on human rights (ECHR), the EU could withdraw criminal law enforcement cooperation.

Badenoch was asked about the report from Lord Wolfson KC, the shadow attorney general, about the practical implications of leaving the (ECHR).

Wolfson said that the entire post-Brexit trade deal with the EU is not conditional on the UK remaining in the ECHR. But the part of the treaty dealing with criminal law enforcement cooperation is conditional on the UK being signed up to the convention, he said.

If the UK were to leave, the EU would be justified in suspending those cooperation measures, he said. But he said that each side can withdraw from the whole treaty anyway with 12 months’ notice. He said:

The real analysis is a political one as to whether the EU would ostensibly rely on ECHR withdrawal to threaten immediate termination of that part [the criminal law enforcement cooperation part], potentially with a view to renegotiating the TCA [trade and cooperation agreement] …

In conclusion, there is no escaping the fact that withdrawal from the ECHR would provide the EU with a ground to terminate part 3 of the TCA. However, there exists a right to terminate by either party for any reason whatsoever in any event on twelve months’ notice. As such, the consequences of any such withdrawal are more likely to be political than legal. There is, of course, a prospect that the EU may waive its right to terminate, and proceed on the basis of the current TCA terms. That is a political analysis beyond the scope of this advice.

Anna Foster asked Badenoch how she would deal with these problems if she went ahead with ECHR withdrawal.

Badenoch said she commissioned the report because she wanted to know what the difficulties would be. She said she was being honest about the problems.

She said the trade agreement allowed the UK to terminate it after 12 months anyway. And she said the trade agreement could continue if the UK left the ECHR. She went on:

[Wolfson] is talking about potential things that could happen that we’ll need to think about in case people [the EU] behave in a way that would be extraordinary. He’s not saying that this will definitely happen, but I want to know what all the possibilities are.

She also said the Tories would spend the next four years dealing with these issues. Alex Burghart, the shadow Northern Ireland secretary and shadow Cabinet Office minister, will be working on this, she said.

Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, has also been giving interviews this morning, and he has defended the comments about Handsworth reported by the Guardian that have been described as racist.

• Jenrick insisted that he was right to make a case for integration. He told Sky News:

I want to live in a country which is well integrated. I want people to be living side-by-side, I never want to see segregated or even ghettoised communities. We want people of all skin colours, of all religions, to be living in harmonious, well-integrated communities with our kids growing up alongside each other.

And I’m afraid in certain parts of the country, there are communities where that just isn’t the case, and parts of Handsworth in Birmingham, where I was earlier in the year, a place I know quite well, growing up in the West Midlands, just don’t resemble that. That makes me very worried.

• He defended mentioning colour. Speaking on Radio 5 Live, he pointed out that the comments reported in the Guardian included him saying: “It’s not about the colour of your skin or your faith, of course it isn’t. But I want people to be living alongside each other, not parallel lives.” Asked, if that was the case, why he had mentioned colour, he replied:

Because it’s incredibly important that we have a fully integrated society regardless of the colour of their skin or the faith that they abide by.

I think it’s a very dangerous place if we have a country where people are living in ghettoised communities where people are not living together side by side in harmonious communities.

• He linked the Manchester synagogue attack with lack of integration. He told Sky News:

There are real dangers if we don’t live in a well-integrated community, then this can lead to serious, serious challenges.

Look, just the other day here in Manchester, we saw a man who had lived in this country for 30 years, but was clearly not integrated into our society, clearly did not share British values, committing an appalling terrorist attack by going to a synagogue and killing British Jews. That is, at the extreme level, where failures of integration lead, and that’s why we’ve got to have a debate about this, and not have it shut down whenever anyone puts their head above the parapet and talks about it publicly.

• He said it was “disgraceful” to suggest that comments like his would encourage far-right groups. When this suggestion was made to him on Sky News, he replied:

I think that’s an absolutely disgraceful and ridiculous comment. I tell you what gives rise to extremist views, with all due respect, journalists like yourself, trying to shut down legitimate and fair debate. What you are implying is that you can’t say comments like that.

Unlike Badenoch (see 7.41am and 9.03am), he did not claim that his comments had not been accurately reported by the Guardian.

The events in Manchester are subject to an ongoing police investigation and we won’t be allowing comments relating directly to them BTL. If readers don’t comply with at, comments will get closed.

In his interview on BBC Radio WM, Richard Parker, the Labour mayor of the West Midlands, was asked if he thought Robert Jenrick’s comments about Handsworth were racist. Parker replied:

I do. Because he’s set out intentionally to draw on a particular issue - people’s colour - to identify the point he wanted to make.

No other politician that I know in the West Midlands of a mainstream party would seek to do that explicitly and with the intent that he did.

The issue for me is that rather than reflect on the positive aspects of that community ... he wanted to draw on a particular issue of ethnicity and colour. I think that is simply wrong.

It shows a lack of respect and understanding for those communities. And I doubt whether or not if he went to a largely white community anywhere in the West Midlands he’d be making a comment similar to what he made about Handsworth.

Richard Parker, the Labour mayor of the West Midlands, has condemned Robert Jenrick for his comments about Handsworth. According to PA Media, Parker said he considered Jenrick’s comments about Handsworth racist and questioned he would have made equivalent remarks about a predominantly white area.

Speaking to BBC Radio WM, Parker said:

I’m angry, I’m appalled. Frankly, I’m disgusted and I want everyone to know in Handsworth - and I’ve got many friends in Handsworth - that I will stand up for you.

Handsworth is a really vibrant community with lots of faiths and ethnicities working together and living together. The Soho Road is one of the most vibrant and successful high streets anywhere in the country.

Claiming Jenrick had defined people by the colour of their skin “with intent and with a real purpose” and gone to Handsworth without reflecting on the positive contribution local people make to Birmingham, Parker said:

That’s terribly disappointing. That raises serious questions about whether someone like Robert Jenrick should be allowed to be even a member of the Conservative party.

I think there are serious issues now for Kemi Badenoch to discuss with Robert Jenrick and senior members of the Conservative party about whether someone like Jenrick should be allowed to stand and sit as a Conservative politician.

Andy Street, Parker’s Tory predecessor as mayor, has also condemned Jenrick’s comments. (See 8.13am.)

I have beefed up the post at 7.45am with fuller quotes from Kemi Badenoch in response to claims that the Tory conference feels empty (which it does) because so few people are here.

One point Badenoch made was that corporate lobbyists are staying away. That is true too; there is no point lobbying a party if you don’t think it will be in government.

Badenoch said:

A lot of the people who came just because we were in government, the corporate lobbyists, yes, they’re not there, but our members are here. This is one of the first conferences I’ve been to where it has really felt like the members owned it, and I’m really proud of that.

I have updated some of the other earlier posts too with direct quotes from the interviews. You may need to refresh the page to get those updates to appear.

Asked about defections, Badenoch says she wants people in her party “for the right reasons”.

People joining Reform UK are joining a party in favour of higher spending.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

What we are doing is shedding a lot of the baggage of the last 14 years. I remember last year we had people defecting to Labour because Labour was doing well in the polls. Now we have people defecting to Reform because Reform is doing well in the polls.

We need people who are in our party for the right reasons.

Nick Ferrari from LBC is interviewing Kemi Badenoch now.

Q: A poll yesterday said half of members want you to stand down. What would you say to them?

Badenoch says she is not bothered. She claims a poll before the leadership contest last year said she would lose. She says “these polls are not accurate”.

Reid asks about another defection. She is referring to this announcement from Reform UK.

Rushcliffe councillor Debbie Soloman has joined Reform UK, saying only Nigel Farage’s party have the answers to the biggest problems facing the country.

Cllr Debbie Soloman has represented Newton on the council since 2023, and had previously been a member of the Conservative party. But she says “The Conservative party is over. Only Reform can deliver the change Britain needs’”.

Badenoch says it was always going to be a difficult journey back, and you lose some people along the way.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

Reform is a party that wants to spend more on welfare. We know there’s some Conservatives who agree with those policies, on increased welfare, on nationalisation and if that’s what they think is right for them, then we’re sorry to lose them. But we need to make it very clear that we are the party of fiscal responsibility …

It’s going to be a long journey back from a historic defeat and on very long, difficult journeys you will lose some people on the way. But if these people cannot stick with us because opposition is difficult, then they’re not going to be able to stick with us when government gets difficult.

Q: Leaving the ECHR will cause a problem with our post-Brexit trade deal with the EU. How will you deal with that?

Badenoch says the trade agreement can be terminated with 12 months’ notice.

But the UK would not need to remain in the ECHR for the deal to continue, she says.

She rejects suggestions that Lord Wolfson, the shadow attorney general who wrote a report for her on this, implied this would make withdrawal too difficult.

She says Alex Burghart is going to look at how ECHR would be implemented.

UPDATE: See 10.56am for the full quotes from Wolfson and Badenoch on this.

Foster asks about the Tory plan for a removals force.

Badenoch does not accept that she failed to answer Laura Kuenssberg’s questions about where the 150,000 the Tories want to deport every year might be deported to.

(She did dodge the questions – see here.)

She says:

They will go where people who are always deported go back home, and if they can’t go back home, then to a third country. That’s what the Rwanda policy was supposed to be.

She says the Tories will negotiate returns agreement with countries.

Kemi Badenoch is on the Today programme now. Anna Foster is interviewing her.

Q: Do you support Jenrick’s comments?

Badenoch says she has not heard the recording. As she suggests Jenrick has been misquoted, Foster says the BBC has heard the recording, and he has not been taken out of context.

Q: Andy Street says Jenrick was wrong. Jenrick said he did not see another white face, and then said he did not want to live in a country like that.

Badenoch says there would have been “context” before that remark. So just looking at two sentences is not fair.

She says she and Jenrick both want a country that is integrated. Skin colour should not matter.

She says we need a “socially cohesive country”.

Q: Is how many white people you see in an area a measure of integration?

Badenoch says people should not care what people look like.

Q: He does.

Badenoch reverts to saying she does not know the context.

But she does not want to live in a country where people are scared of saying things because of concerns about race.

Kemi Badenoch was asked about the Guardian’s story about Robert Jenrick complaining about Handsworth in Birmingham, saying that he did not see another white face when he visited and that it was not the sort of Britain he wanted to live in.

Related: Robert Jenrick complained of ‘not seeing another white face’ in Birmingham neighbourhood

On Newsnight last night Andy Street, the former Tory mayor of the West Midlands, was also asked about Jenrick’s comments. He said:

I was very proud to be mayor of the most diverse place in Britain, a Conservative mayor with that background.

Putting it bluntly, Robert is wrong. It’s a place I know very well, Handsworth. It’s come a hell of a long way in the 40 years since the last civil disturbances there.

And it’s actually a very integrated place. If you go along the main streets there, you will see Sikhs, Hindus, Muslims, Christians, a lot of them of African and Caribbean origin, and of course, white people as well. It is actually one of the most successfully integrated place. Brilliant civic society, brilliant faith leadership.

Asked about Jenrick’s claim that he had seen some of the worst slums ever in Handsworth, Street replied:

I think he was trying to make a point which I don’t agree with.

If you go to the schools in Handsworth, I’ve been to a number recently, you see incredible hope, optimism and people taking part in education which is based around British values and thinking about how they can make a contribution to the future of their their region, their city and their area. That is not a definition of a slum.

Badenoch says she is surprised support for Labour has collapsed so much.

Q: But you have not benefited.

Of course not, says Badenoch. She says at the last election voters kicked the Tories out.

Q: Can you envisage a pact with Reform UK. Two thirds of your members want that?

Badenoch says she is not splitting the right. Reform want more welfare spending, she claims. The only area where they have things in common is immigration. And their plans are not thought through.

She says Reform UK vote for more spending.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

I’m not splitting the right. There is no deal to be done with Reform.

They want to increase welfare. This conference is about living within our means. That’s how we get a stronger economy. They want to nationalise.

What kind of alliance are we having with them?

The only thing that they have in common with us, really, is around immigration. We know that we need stronger borders, but we’ve got a plan that will work.

Their plan, which was copied from some announcements, I think, that we made previously - they hadn’t done the details behind it.

Q: Last year you said you were concerned about the impact of being PM on your family. Do you want the job?

Yes, says Badenoch. She says she wants to be PM to make the country better.

This week her husband said the children had told him they wished she worked at McDonald’s, because they would get free burgers and she would be home more often.

She says she is doing this because she thinks she is the best person for the job.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

We need to turn our country around, and we’re the only party that can deliver that stronger economy and stronger borders that this conference is about.

If I thought someone else could do it, then I’d be taking a step back. I think that I’m the right person and I’m the best person.

Badenoch is now being interviewed on Times Radio by Stig Abell.

Q: Can anyone protest today about Gaza in good faith, given it is the anniversary of the 7 October Hamas attack on Israel.

Badenoch says no.

Q: So should students who are demonstating be punished?

Badenoch says she would not agree with that. She backs free speech, she says.

Nugent shows some pictures of the conference hall half empty at one point, during Mel Stride’s speech.

Badenoch does not accept there is a problem with attendance. She says people have been complaining about not being able to get into fringe meetings. And the hall was full for her speech on Sunday, she says.

They end showing this clip of Badenoch singing at an event last night with young Conservatives.

Party leader, party animal 🇬🇧 🕺 #CPC25 pic.twitter.com/5O3CQPXqoi

— Hugo Rasenberg (@hurasenberg) October 6, 2025

Q: William Hague has a column in the Times today saying there are not enough young members of the party.

Badenoch says the clip shows the opposite. The youth wing is strong, she says.

UPDATE: Badenoch said:

We have had our fringes very full. People have been complaining to me about having to queue to get in.

You can hear my voice is hoarse. I was at an absolutely packed Young Conservatives event where we were singing Sweet Caroline. I probably shouldn’t have been doing that.

We’re having a great time, and I’m really pleased with the number of people who have come to our conference …

A lot of the people who came just because we were in government, the corporate lobbyists, yes, they’re not there, but our members are here. This is one of the first conferences I’ve been to where it has really felt like the members owned it, and I’m really proud of that.

Nugent asks about this Guardian story about Robert Jenrick.

Related: Robert Jenrick complained of ‘not seeing another white face’ in Birmingham neighbourhood

Q: Jenrick talks about wanting people to be properly accurate. Do you approve of that?

Badenoch says, given it is the Guardian, she will take it with “a pinch of salt”. She says:

Given that it’s The Guardian, I think I’m going to take some of that with a pinch of salt.

They haven’t always been the most accurate newspaper.

She suggests the quotes might have been taken out of context.

I don’t know what was being discussed before he said that. But in and of itself, it’s a factual statement.

If he said he didn’t see another white face, he might have been making an observation. There’s nothing wrong with making observations.

But what he and I both agree with is that there are not enough people integrating. There are many people who are creating separate communities. I’m very worried.

Q: So you agree with his concerns?

Badenoch says:

Well, I wasn’t there, so I can’t say how many faces he saw, but the point is that there are many people in our country who are not integrating. I heard that one of the MPs of that area was accusing him of racism. I completely disagree with that. I want to make that very clear. In fact, I’m quite worried about these sectarian MPs who’ve been elected in Birmingham, very, very divisive politics, people who are more interested in talking about Gaza.

Kemi Badenoch is on BBC Breakfast. She is being interviewed by Jon Kaye and Sally Nugent.

Q: Your message is tough to deliver. How will you manager?

Badenoch says politics is about doing the right thing. Labour and Reform UK are making promises they won’t be able to keep. She is being honest. Britain needs to take tough decisions on spending, and to control the borders.

Q: You said you would not announce policies until 2027. But now you are announcing policy. What has changed?

Badenoch says nothing has changed. She goes on:

I never said in 2027 – other people kept asking that.

What I said was that we would not announce policies until we had thought them through. No announcements without plans. That’s the way I do things.

She says she did this with ECHR withdrawal.

This is the way that I do politics. It’s politics done properly. I’m an engineer by background, I have not come from a student politics background, like many in the Labour party.

Good morning. Kemi Badenoch is doing a round of interviews this morning at the Conservative conference in Manchester, and she is likely to be asked about polling out yesterday suggesting half of party members do not think she will lead the party into the next election. Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, came top when YouGov asked members who they would vote for if there is another contest, but not overwhelmingly. Jenrick, who gives his speech in the conference hall today, was on 37%, and YouGov only asked about three other alternatives (Boris Johnson, James Cleverly and Priti Patel).

Here is the agenda for the day.

7.30am: Kemi Badenoch is interviewed on BBC Breakfast. She is also on Times Radio at 7.45am, the Today programme at 8.10am, Good Morning Britain at 8.25am and LBC at 8.45am.

10am: Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, speaks at the conference, followed by Stuart Andrew, the shadow health secretary, at 10.25am.

10.50am: Members have a debate on the meaning of sex.

11.15am: Laura Trott, the shadow education secretary, speaks to the conference.

11.40am: Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary, speaks.

1pm: Jenrick takes part in a fringe Q&A organised by the Daily Telegraph.

2pm: James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, speaks to the conference, followed by Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, at 2.25pm.

2.50pm: Tony Abbott, the former Australian PM, holds a Q&A in the conference hall with Patel.

3.30pm: Michael Heseltine, the former deputy PM, speaks at a fringe meeting on Europe.

Afternoon: Keir Starmer leaves London for a trip to India.

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