Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch has slammed the government over welfare spending and said the “government is not a charity”, while also urging Andy Burnham “to get serious”.
In an interview with GB News Political Editor Christopher Hope, she was asked why voters should listen to her and replied: “We are under new management. Your viewers will know that sometimes you have a football team that’s disappointing. There’s a new captain. There’s a new coach. There’s a new owner, effectively, which is all me. And I’ve got a great team around me. I’ve got a new team of people. We’re changing our policies.
“We know we got things wrong. You know, immigration was too high. I’ve got a plan to fix that. Leaving the ECHR, we’ve got our borders plan – it’s very comprehensive. It’s costed. We found the money, but also we are the only party that has a serious plan to grow our economy, make us all richer, make our country richer.
“We’re the only ones who’ve got a plan on defence at a time when this country is facing threats. You’ve seen what happened at RAF Fairford. We had a power plant shut down by Iran recently, we need to focus on our defence, and that’s why I’ve announced the new Britannia Shield and an air defence system that will protect us.”
Asked how she can convince people that she would actually do that in office, she said: “Because we are serious about doing this. I’m not all talk. People can look at my personal record in government, and they know that I got things done.
“But one of the things I’m also doing is making sure that the people who come into the Conservative Party, sign up to do what it is we’re going to do – none of the nonsense from before, where people signed up as Conservative MPs and were voting with Labour.
“We’re putting out a contract. People have to agree to the policies on leaving the ECHR, on scrapping net zero targets. They’re not fixing climate change, but they are making the whole country poorer and deindustrialising. We are serious.”
On tax, Badenoch said: “We have something for everybody. It doesn’t matter whether you’re retired, whether you’re earning £10,000, £50,000, or £100, or a million. We want to make sure that you can fulfil your aspirations. I’ll be saying a lot more in my speech tomorrow.
“People know my views on inheritance taxes. I’ve given speeches on them, but I’ve also said that we need to find the money to pay for these things. We are the fiscally responsible party. That’s something that’s got to be important to your viewers because if we run out of money, none of us are going to have anything.
“We need to get people off welfare and into work. The best welfare is a well-paying job. That means a lot of tough love. We’ve announced policies on that, and so there will be something for everybody. But we cannot be in a situation where we turn government into a charity where government only does things for those who are most vulnerable.
“Government has a responsibility to grow the economy and make sure everybody, from the poorest to the wealthiest are able to get on, and there’s people out there who create the jobs who are saying that they’re not seeing enough, and I have an offer for them.”
Asked about changes to National Insurance, she said: “What we have seen is youth unemployment skyrocket. This is the first time since the year 2000 that youth unemployment is higher here in the UK than the EU average. Since Labour came into office, we’ve seen youth unemployment increase by 174,000 to about 750,000. That is astronomical.
“People aren’t hiring young people anymore. So we’re going to reverse Labour’s jobs tax on young people, and we’re going to go even further, bringing NICs payments to about 7.5% if you’re aged between 21 and 24.”
She also committed to stopping small boats crossing the Channel: “We can, and we will. Do you remember when people used to come in through the Channel tunnel? It was the Conservatives that stopped that. But with the boat crossings, we need to leave the Convention on Human Rights. You can’t do it without that.
“The reason why we have this problem with asylum centres and migrant hotels is that more and more people are coming, and the government won’t do the one thing that it needs to do. We tried everything else in government; didn’t work.
“It’s not a silver bullet. You have to start with that. But there’s other stuff that you need to do. Rwanda too. Rwanda, you need a third country deterrent. Rwanda or somewhere else. We need to scrap the immigration tribunals that are just rubber stamping everybody’s applications, whether they need asylum or not.
“From our perspective, we need to work with European partners. They have this problem too. Visa sanctions, a border force removing people who shouldn’t be.
“We will stop the boats. We tried everything except for one thing that would help us get over the line, and now we’ll do it.”
She also said the Tories will maintain the triple lock on pensions: “The triple lock is not the problem. The triple lock is what we need to stop pensioner poverty. I want us to focus on people who can work who are not working, not on vulnerable people, the disabled or elderly people who cannot work.
“So we said a triple lock is our policy. Andy Burnham, I don’t know why he’s talking about removing it because it’s not going to pay for the thing, the national care system that he’s talking about. He’s got his sums wrong. He’s not talking about growing the economy. The triple lock is safe with us.”
Asked if she would reverse changes made by Labour, she said: “Well, that’s a hypothetical. You know, we’re not going to try and trick the viewers. We don’t know what’s going to happen. But right now, we’re saying the triple lock is our policy. We would keep it if we voted in.”
On Number 10 North, she said: “I don’t even know what this gimmick is supposed to be doing. So this is what the government has been doing wrong. I’ve got a book here called The Right Way. All these sorts of gimmicks, this is how government gets distracted.
“Andy Burnham needs to talk about how he’s going to make people richer, create jobs. Creating an office in Manchester only creates a handful of jobs for civil servants. It’s not a serious thing.”
Asked if she would scrap it, she said: “Well, I don’t know. It’s not an important thing. It’s an office block. We might move people somewhere else. Number 10 North is a gimmick for Andy Burnham. He thinks Manchester is the entire country. He is not the Mayor of Greater Manchester anymore. He’s the Prime Minister.”
She was asked if Andy Burnham should disclose meetings he held with Manchester City officials as Mayor of Greater Manchester, she said: “He should. I’m surprised he hasn’t done that already.
“The freedom of information request should get those things out. Otherwise, what’s being hidden? I think that the comments he made show that he still thinks he is the Mayor of Manchester. He is not acting like the prime minister of the United Kingdom, and we need a prime minister who can sort out our defence, sort out our economy, sort out welfare, get drilling oil and gas in the north.
“He needs to get serious and start focusing on British energy. That means drilling our own oil and gas.”
Asked if Diego Garcia should be used by US bomber aircraft, she said: “Yes. Why is the US removing its bombers? I am worried that they think that we’re not a serious country, we’re not taking defence seriously. The government has to focus on defence.
“Where is the money to fund the defence investment plan? We waited two years. They paused our plans, took two years for theirs. We haven’t seen the money. They’ve kicked it into next autumn. That’s another year. We need to sort these threats out now, and I think that’s what the US is seeing.”
On forming a pact with Reform UK, she said: “I want Reform voters to come back to us. The people in Reform, as politicians, the MPs, especially the ones who left our party, they’re people who just cause problems. You talked about their conference. It was overshadowed by an expose and scandals. You know they deny it, but they keep having these problems.
“Their leader in Wales had to step down after being arrested. The one before him is in prison for taking bribes from Russia. I don’t want to do a deal with those types of people. I want Reform voters to come back to us, back to the Conservatives.”
Asked if she would welcome Reform MPs back into the Conservative Party, Badenoch said: “No, no, they’ve gone. Many of them, they’re the ones who caused the problems in the first place, and now they want to pretend they had nothing to do with it.”