1 month ago
Reports of Conservative plots against Rishi Sunak are the work of just “one or two” MPs, and the party needs to unite before May’s local elections, Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary has argued.
In a sometimes combative media round, Badenoch also said the Tories did not need to return £10m in donations from Frank Hester, saying that it was only the media that were still interested in his comments about Diane Abbott, widely condemned as racist and misogynist.
“I’m actually quite surprised that people suggest this,” she told LBC when asked if the party should refuse donations from Hester, after the Guardian revealed he told a 2019 meeting that seeing Abbott on TV made “you just want to hate all black women”.
“This was something that happened five years ago,” Badenoch said. “He wasn’t talking to Diane Abbott. It wasn’t even really about Diane Abbott. He used her in a reference that was completely unacceptable. He’s apologised for it.”
When the Guardian first reported the comments, Hester released a statement saying he “accepts that he was rude about Diane Abbott in a private meeting several years ago but his criticism had nothing to do with her gender nor colour of skin”. The statement said Hester abhorred racism, “not least because he experienced it as the child of Irish immigrants in the 1970s”.
As well as the confirmed £10m already handed over, Hester has reportedly offered the party another £5m, which would mean his donations alone are worth almost as much as the Conservatives spent in the entire 2019 election campaign.
Badenoch was similarly dismissive of a series of reports over the weekend and on Monday that some Tory MPs are plotting to remove Sunak, with the party still trailing by up to 20 points behind Labour in opinion polling.
A series of stories suggested that Penny Mordaunt, the Commons leader, could be used as a figure around which rebels could coalesce, while one said Sunak would simply call an election if his position was challenged.
“I think it is actually very easy for one or two people out of 350 to talk to the papers and generate news headlines,” Badenoch told LBC.
“Yes, of course, there will be some people who are unhappy. I’m not going to deny that, but we need to move away from the scenario where one or two people can create all the news and 300 others can’t get a word.
“At this particular time it’s really important that we remember there are thousands of councillors all around the country who are going to be standing for election in May. We need people to focus on what they’ve been doing to help their local communities, and not be obsessed with Westminster psychodrama.”
After Hester’s comments emerged last week, Downing Street initially condemned them only as wrong, declining to say they were racist until over 24 hours later – soon after Badenoch had become the first cabinet minister to say this.
Asked why she had done it, Badenoch told Sky that the issue was “particularly pertinent because it was about a black woman, [and] I’m the only black woman in the cabinet”.
But when asked whether it was problematic for the Conservatives to accept such large donations from Hester, who also said that Abbott, the UK’s longest-serving black MP, “should be shot”, Badenoch said she was “amazed” that she was still being asked about the issue, blaming the media for being out of touch.
“The only reason why it’s still dominating the front page is because you are not interested in the work that government is doing,” she told BBC One’s Breakfast programme.
“You are interested in a story from last week, which has been apologised for, and everyone has moved on. It’s more reflective about what the BBC is interested in.”
Asked by Sky News if the Conservatives should refuse new donations from Hester, a hugely wealthy IT entrepreneur, Badenoch said not, but hinted that this could change if new comments by him emerged, adding: “Obviously, if something else happens in the future, that might be something that we reconsider.”
