Conservative Party nearly ran out of money, says Badenoch

Kemi Badenoch said the Conservative Party nearly ran out of money when she took over as leader, following their worst-ever election defeat.

Badenoch said she inherited a party facing internal problems, with donors considering pulling funding after the loss of 250 seats in last year’s general election – the worst result in Conservative history.

Speaking to the BBC’s Newscast to mark her first year as Conservative Party leader, Badenoch said she spent her first months “working furiously behind the scenes”, leading to some thinking her team “were not doing anything”.

But Badenoch defended her position arguing: “Without money, a party can’t survive.”

Asked if there was risk that the Conservatives could have gone bankrupt, Badenoch said: “Yes, there was.”

Badenoch would not say how near the party came to going running out of money, but admitted there was a moment when donors could have walked away.

Speaking to the BBC, she said keeping donors on board “actually took quite a lot of quite a lot of my time” which she wished she had spent “out there a bit more”.

Badenoch insists the party is now on a firmer footing and has begun to set out a new policy agenda, thanks to the groundwork she laid in the first few months.

In a wide-ranging interview, Badenoch spoke about learning on the job, including realising she should treat Prime Minister’s Questions more as “panto” than a cross-examination.

The Conservative leader admitted she initially spent a day preparing lines and data, only to find that people were not following what she was saying.

“It is more theatre than it is a prosecution or interrogation,” she said.

“It is the nature of British politics that we will have a panto” while political debate in other countries will have other “culturally appropriate analogies”, she argued.