Kemi Badenoch took a swipe at Nigel Farage over rumours Elon Musk is set to donate to Reform UK.
The Tory leader questioned whether the tech billionaire will give the insurgent party any money during a grilling on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
She said the Reform leader “says a whole load of things”, adding: “I don’t say them unless they are true.”
Pressed on why Mr Musk would donate to Reform and not the Conservatives, Ms Badenoch said: “I don’t think he’s actually giving them anything. I think he said that he wasn’t.
“All we’ve seen is Nigel Farage saying he’s going to give me money and Mr Farage says a whole load of things. I don’t say them unless they are true.”
The Tory leader also insisted Reform’s offer to voters is “not good enough” and “not real conservatism” as she was grilled on not setting out more policy positions.
She said: “Six weeks is all that we have done. But what I would say to the Reform offer is that it’s not good enough, it’s not real conservatism, it’s not based on principles, it’s all about what it is against. We are about what we are for.”
Elsewhere, Ms Badenoch said that Andrea Jenkyns, the former Tory minister who defected to Reform, does not “like me” but “I don’t really care”.
Asked about defections to Reform from the Conservatives, she said: “With some of those people, Andrea Jenkyns, for example, it’s very personal – don’t like me.”
Pressed on why she thought Ms Jenkyns disliked her, Ms Badenoch said: “Honestly, I don’t really care.
“There are loads of other people who do like me. It’s politics. Some people will, some people won’t… There’s this great song by Baz Luhrmann that you know, remember compliments you receive, forget the insults, called Everyone’s Free to Wear Sunscreen. That’s sort of how I try and live.”
She said that if people are members of a party “just because they want to be part of the new big thing, or they want to be part of whoever is leading in the polls, then they don’t believe in what we are about”.
