Four months after its electoral blow in the United Kingdom, the Conservative Party voted to find a new leader… or a new leader. The election took place from October 15 to 31 and the results will be published on Saturday November 2. The two candidates to take the lead of the Tories are, on the one hand, the former Minister of Commerce of Nigerian origin, Kemi Badenoch, and on the other, the very right-wing former Minister of Immigration, Robert Jenrick.
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What the two candidates have in common is being on the right of the conservative spectrum, being in their forties and having three children. During their respective campaigns, the two finalists assumed a very right-wing positioning.
Robert Jenrick would like the United Kingdom leaves the European Convention on Human Rights, which, according to him, prevents borders from being secured, underlines our regional correspondent, Thomas Harms. Jenrick had resigned from Rishi Sunak’s government in December 2023, because he found that the policy for sending migrants to Rwanda did not go far enough. His five priorities are reducing immigration, fighting zero-carbon policies, building more, reducing the size of government and defending “ British culture “.
In October 2024, after a Commonwealth summit marked by a call from member countries to the United Kingdom to open the chapter on financial reparations for slavery, he said in a column in Daily Mail that any criticism aimed at the British colonial empire was a form of antipatriotism.
This 42-year-old former business lawyer also calls for the creation of a “ new conservative party “: he assures that training requires reforms similar to those undertaken by Margaret Thatcher in the 70s. Elected MP since 2014, Robert Jenrick is a fan of the former Prime Minister, to the point of having given “Thatcher” as second first name to his daughter.
Immigration is not not good for our country » says Kemi Badenoch
For his part, Kemi Badenoch wants above all to return to the values at the heart of the Conservative Party, namely less state and less social policies. Born in London, she grew up between Nigeria and the United States before returning at age 16 to the United Kingdom for his studies.
Minister under Boris Johnson, Liz Truss Then Rishi Sunakshe gained notoriety when, in charge of Women and Equality, she supported the restriction of transgender rights and their banning in places reserved for women.
Before entering politics, this trained engineer, fiercely “anti-woke”, had worked in the banking and IT sectors. Firmly opposed to immigration, which is “not not good for our country », she presented herself for the first time to become leader of the party in 2022. While she was still little known, she rose to fourth position.
We stay with the two most right-wing candidates. There is pressure from Nigel Farage’s right-wing populist party.
Nicholas Startin, British political scientist and professor of international relations
The leader of this party will become the leader of the opposition and will face Labor Keir Starmer every Wednesday at noon in the House of Commons for the traditional questions to the Prime Minister. But the task already promises to be difficult. In particular, internal divisions and a flight of voters towards the far-right Reform UK party are at issue.
Also readUnited Kingdom: a very right-wing duel for the election of the new leader of the Conservatives