Kemi Badenoch claimed the famous Brexit slogan for herself when she vowed to “take back control!” This time her target was activist judges and lawyers, both in a European court and here at home, who she said are running roughshod over our democratically-elected Parliament and government.
In a major speech in Westminster, she accused the legal establishment of practicing “lawfare” to stop the UK deporting illegal immigrants with no right to be here, prevent eco-fanatic protestors from being punished when they break the law, and persecute our soldiers with vexatious legal actions.
Mrs Badenoch insisted: “Britain is being mugged!”
The headline news was that she has appointed Lord Wolfson, a highly-experienced barrister and the Shadow Attorney General, to lead a review into whether the UK should leave the European Convention on Human Rights.
As long as the UK is a member, we can be taken to the European Court in Strasbourg by people who feel their rights have been violated (this is separate to the European Union, which is why it still affects us after Brexit). It also means that courts here at home have to take the Convention into account.
However, Mrs Badenoch also clearly feels that the problem goes beyond the European Convention. At one point she said it was “so important that the impartiality of every British judge is beyond reproach” – which rather implies she thinks it’s not beyond reproach at the moment.
She also spoke about problems with UK legislation such as the Human Rights Act and the Equality Act, suggesting there are more big changes she would like to make.
But right now she is looking at the European Convention, and will make an announcement at the Conservative Party conference in October. It seems pretty obvious that this means she will announce the UK is leaving, but it will still be a big deal when she says it officially.
It suggests the Conservatives are getting good at PR. Who would have thought?
The assembled media, however, wanted to talk about something else. When it was time for them to ask questions, they asked Mrs Badenoch why the Conservatives are behind in the polls while Reform are steaming ahead.
She went on the attack. Reform are not a serious party, she said, and pointed out that even former chairman Zia Yousef, when he resigned yesterday, said: “I no longer believe working to get a Reform government elected is a good use of my time.” He was right, said Mrs Badenoch,
The Conservative leader also claimed Reform are “a left-wing party”, pointing out that it wanted to spend billions on giving people more benefits. Reform’s policy of axing the two-child benefit cap would cost anything from £2.5bn to £4.5bn according to experts.
But she also rather sweetly insisted she was getting better. Being leader of the opposition is hard, she said. “Every week, I have more experience,” said Mrs Badenoch. “Every week, it gets better and better”.
