‘Abrasive’ Kemi Badenoch urged to play nice to secure Conservative leadership

Supporters of Kemi Badenoch have urged her to rein in her confrontational style to clinch the Tory leadership, with some Conservative MPs concluding they need to take “a big gamble” to restore their party’s fortunes as they replace Rishi Sunak.

The shadow communities secretary emerged from the only scheduled televised debate on GB News last week with most MPs believing she is still the favourite in what remains a close contest with Robert Jenrick. Party members have until the end of the month to cast their vote.

However, Tory MPs backing Badenoch revealed they had been urging her to curb her confrontational style for the duration of the contest to ensure she gets over the line. Badenoch is known to be uncompromising in her views and demands, having already stated ­during the campaign that some civil servants perform so badly they should be in prison. One senior MP backing Badenoch said they had urged her to tone down her approach to ensure she secures the post, in order to convince party members to take a risk and back her.

“Kemi is more popular with the membership. She’s seen as charismatic, but she’s also seen by some of us as abrasive,” they said. “I gave her some tough advice. She needs to be pragmatically ruthless and think about the issues she wants to fight on, because the election will be very different in three or four years.”

Another Badenoch ally said: “As Kemi said on GB News, she is happy to confront people who come after conservatives, but she won’t engage in blue-on-blue. Kemi wants to unite people around our core principles, rather than divide the party with more of the same easy promises that won’t get delivered.”

While some MPs remain alienated from the race, believing both candidates are too far to the right to forge a successful appeal to voters as a whole, some have opted to back Badenoch because they believe the party will need to make waves if it is to make an impression in opposition.

“I think she’ll turn herself into a bit of a Boadicea,” said an MP. “[Nigel] Farage will look a bit odd against her. She’ll be quite a character, and we need a character. We don’t need a technocrat at the moment. She is authentic. I think we’re taking a big gamble, but we probably will, because we think she’s going to cut through.”

Badenoch, who has opted not to announce significant new policies during the race, defended her combative approach last week, saying it was “doing what is right for our country – following our conviction, being brave and not being scared because the Guardian or whoever is going to mock us”.

Ballots were sent to party members this week, with the winner to be announced on 2 November.