Inside 100 Days Of Kemi Badenoch

Lee Rowley, Kemi Badenoch’s chief of staff and closest political friend, sat the shadow cabinet down at its first meeting of 2025 and set out the Tories’ path from its worst election result in centuries back to No 10.

Rowley, once of KPMG, has dubbed his master plan the ‘Three, Five’ strategy. It has three, year-long phases: admit mistakes, build credibility, win power. These are to be navigated by five objectives: to win, to rebuild, to compete, to gain public trust and to jump ahead – informed by learning from sister parties abroad.

Like most such political strategies, however, Rowley’s ‘Three, Five’ has had an awkward encounter with reality since its launch from the whiteboard. And now another number is approaching that will bring scrutiny on just how well Badenoch is doing as leader of the opposition (Loto). As she approaches her first 100 days (10 February), in what former incumbents have described as the worst job in British politics, it is not hard to find those ready to write her off.

“All the things we thought she’d be good at, she’s not. And all the things we thought she’d be bad at, she is,” observes a former cabinet minister dryly.

A CCHQ figure says: “She is better at defending her choices than she is driving forward a movement,” which makes leadership difficult. A back bencher adds: “She hasn’t got a narrative working yet.”

Allies, however, insist that she has the resilience and strategic nous for the job – and are urging doubters to stick with the plan – and with her. “She is building her fight. Getting the right people around her. Being strategic. It is not going to come in four months, but she will be better for it in four years’ time,” says one.

“It's almost like a startup mentality,” a shadow cabinet minister adds, “you've got to try and build something very, very rapidly in a changing political environment”.

“Expectations are high, and the expectation you can do things quickly is very high, so it's trying to build that out whilst building something that's sustainable and deals with the problems of the past.”

Phase one of the Rowley plan is rebuilding trust by admitting mistakes from their 14 years of government and demonstrating they have changed.

It is why they chose to lead on immigration for Badenoch’s first speech as leader, joined by her shadow home secretary Chris Philp. But one Tory figure says it was “really badly judged, didn’t have a message and just wasn’t very good”.

Priti Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, then undermined the whole objective when she defended her record as home secretary at a time of record net migration. “Priti ruined all of our days,” sighs a CCHQ source. Another says: “Imagine if the person who had been cheating the entire time during your long-term relationship just came back and said, ‘Don’t you remember I did cook once a week, wasn’t that fantastic?’ That is what we’re dealing with.”

It falls to head of policy Victoria Hewson to try to convince shadow cabinet ministers to disavow their past. It is, most admit, a tough gig made harder still by the fact that some are in the same briefs as before.

Andrew Bowie, the shadow Scotland secretary who is filling in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (Desnz) brief while Claire Coutinho is on maternity leave, reportedly complained that he was put in a difficult position by the leadership after an old policy speech of his – given when he served as a Desnz minister – was quoted back at him in the Commons by the Labour side.

Badenoch’s performances in the Chamber have not instilled confidence, disappointing those who thought she would bring gutsiness to PMQs. “She looks like she’s given into her nerves,” says a CCHQ figure. But a shadow cabinet minister maintains: “She's in good spirits. She's a very courageous person.”

Badenoch is not keen on taking advice about how to improve, however. Those MPs who worked on prepping her predecessors have not been asked to help out. When the new Tory leader was asked whether she should seek counsel from William Hague, who it was pointed out was an impressive despatch box performer, she shot back: “Look what good that did him.”

Then there are the smaller missteps, like the claim she would never reshuffle her top team before the next election. Unforced errors arise from a chronic staff shortage. There are barely a dozen in the Loto office. “It’s taken a little bit of time to get the various component parts in place,” an insider admits. Only recently did it develop the real capacity to arrange outside operations and events.

she’s got very good relationships with former leaders

Badenoch plans to visit Tory associations and appear at business Q&As in a forthcoming tour, which some unofficially refer to as ‘Kemi Connects’. Although similar to David Cameron’s approach in opposition, the real inspiration is the much-admired Canadian Conservative leader.

“Parliament does not matter right now,” says an insider. “She knows she has got to get out and about like Pierre Poilievre.”

Poilievre does not use much of his own account on TikTok but has other people post clips of him – something Badenoch also wants to replicate. (The party is recruiting more digital staff.)

Badenoch has been known to seek advice from Cameron on where genuine issues lie versus things that will pass – “she’s got very good relationships with former leaders”, a shadow cabinet minister flags – but as one CCHQ insider says, “You also can’t underestimate the way in which Kemi is driven by her own confidence and motivation.”

As well as chief of staff Rowley, Baroness (Rachel) Maclean and deputy chief of staff Henry Newman make up a ‘quad’ with Badenoch at the top of CCHQ. One Tory says: “While others might be with her all the time, they are not being let in like they are. They might be commissioned for information, but the quad are the decision-makers.” Another adds: “Kemi and Lee are paranoid about trusting anyone else.”

A wider group includes Alex Burghart, shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and Julia Lopez, Badenoch’s PPS. Both are loyal friends from the 2017 intake. Numerous MPs raise their concerns about Maclean’s appointment as director of strategy. “There has to be better people doing that job than Rachel,” one shadow cabinet minister says. Another MP has already given her the moniker ‘Car-crash Maclean’. The justification for the appointment offered by a CCHQ source is unlikely to reassure. “Rachel is part of the friendship group and would’ve been the only one without a job.”

Phase two of Rowley’s plan – due to start sometime next year – involves the Tories demonstrating credibility, focusing on becoming a credible alternative to government instead of Labour. This, evidently, is where she thinks she can pull clear of Reform.

During campaigning at the start of the month, Badenoch addressed Reform and claimed to members that this was just a flash in the pan, four years from an election. Some make the comparison with the time Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg was polling almost as popular as Winston Churchill. “A moment in time,” one CCHQ source says.

The looming May local elections are, nevertheless, a concern and one shadow minister says will prove a “shifting point”. Party co-chairman Nigel Huddleston told an internal meeting the Tories would lose all but one of the councils they currently hold and overall lose half of their council seats up for grabs under the general election vote shares.

An initial campaign battle plan has already been drawn up by Huddleston and Rowley.

A senior Tory predicts: “They’ll do the classic CCHQ thing, which will be to depress expectations as much as possible, and then try and beat them on the terrible results. But the danger is that it reinforces the narrative of Reform surging.”

The most cut-through we’ve had is that she doesn’t like sandwiches

There are bright spots: Laura Trott and Neil O’Brien have been praised for their work in education, having pushed Labour to amend its Schools Bill. But Robert Jenrick has upset shadow cabinet colleagues with his apparent jostling for position.

This led to an awkward moment when, in mentioning a conversation with SNP Westminster leader Stephen Flynn, Badenoch asked Jenrick whether the pair were friends. The shadow justice secretary exclaimed: “Well, I’m friends with everyone!” Others around the table struggled to maintain composure.

But one senior Tory provides a different perspective: “If the shadow cabinet and the leadership are concerned about Jenrick’s airtime and attention, perhaps they should be putting in the same level of effort.”

Outside the shadow cabinet room, other Tories wish they would put more effort into taking the fight to the enemy. Some detect a defeatism that comes with the passive acceptance that the nation has tuned out. One MP observes: “The most cut-through we’ve had is that she doesn’t like sandwiches.”

“I think they’ve got to remember, you’ve got to be scrappy to get heard,” one Tory figure says. “There needs to be a kind of a big jolt of action from the shadow cabinet to just get going.”

A former cabinet minister puts it plainly: “It is great if you have people who are intelligent and hard-working. You can even have people who are intelligent but don’t put in the effort, or people who are a bit thick but very hard-working. What you can’t have are people who are dumb and lazy.”

But a shadow cabinet minister defends the approach and explains how Loto is trying to “balance those competing views about the right way forward” between those who say “policy now” and others who say “stay steady”.

Badenoch, however, is determined to take the time to work up proper policies that can connect at a time when the voters may be more interested.

The plan involves holding Labour’s feet to the fire and in a presentation to shadow cabinet, Richard Fuller, the shadow chief secretary to the treasury, explained to his colleagues how they could keep track and show up the government’s spending commitments, while not falling into the trap of setting their own early on.

One shadow cabinet minister says: “Kemi has, in her mind, a clear plan of how this goes, and holding her nerve in terms of doing that deep-thinking whilst trying to respond to the demands people have of her.”

The final phase of the Rowley plan is focused on readying the party machinery to be election-ready by the end of 2027.

Badenoch is launching a series of policy commissions led by the shadow cabinet, with members asked to determine three or four questions to answer with policies. The first stage is being launched any time soon, with the ‘listening’ process set to last until party conference.

Further input will come from a series of steering groups – including one to represent the views of the under-45s – as part of an effort to tie in MPs and members to the policy-making process.

The party is also looking to engage its MPs in political duties. In an email to backbench Tory MPs, Loto wrote that they are establishing a series of ‘taskforces’ to help “tackle specific party-political projects”.

The first of these is looking at building a network with Conservative parties abroad. Overseen by Patel, the shadow foreign secretary, its focus is on nurturing individual relationships, and MPs were told it is not linked to policy development. 

One shadow cabinet minister, flagging Badenoch’s trips to Canada and the United States, says: “A lot of the key relationships that we need to build have not been tended to well enough in recent years, and it's incumbent on all of us to use our networks to rebuild those key links… it is about understanding where the center-right is moving across the western world, and learning how those movements have been able to renew themselves, which is effectively the same journey that we're on.”

Meanwhile, cash is a headache. Voluntary redundancies have seen the size of CCHQ shrink to between 40 and 60 people.

“We need some big sums of money now just to keep the lights on. If I was being a little bit bitchy, I think there has been a bit of a surprise at CCHQ because Kemi has not brought with her a set of donors,” says a source.

The party’s co-chairman Lord (Dominic) Johnson, who was assigned with the task of finding donors, is coming under fire. “He’s a posh buffoon,” says one former cabinet minister.

Another former cabinet minister raises the issue of her shadow cabinet appointments bringing money to the party: “I think a lot of people in the donor scene see that and think it’s not serious, the fact that she’s put those people in.”

Asked about the claims, a party source points out that dips in donations to parties are normal after elections and Labour recently justified a pay freeze for staff because of depleted coffers. They also insist that Badenoch has brought in new donors, as well as bringing back some who had previously supported the party, including a £250,000 donation from Lord Ashcroft on the day she won.

The candidates department at CCHQ has lost its main staff, with just two individuals in their 20s now running the show. “You might say it doesn’t matter at this stage, but it’s kind of an indication of where the party is at,” one CCHQ source says. “And donors want to know the sort of high-caliber, quality people they are donating to, support and get into Parliament.”

CCHQ is in the process of taking on a new chair of the candidates committee, with applications opened by the party’s chairman of the national convention, Julian Ellacott. Loto is understood to have asked that the process be slowed down to get the right person. Senior figures like former chief whip Simon Hart and former MP Philip Davies, the husband of Esther McVey, are understood to have already applied for the influential role.

there has been a bit of a surprise at CCHQ because Kemi has not brought with her a set of donors

One shadow cabinet minister has fears over the party’s ability to keep hold of its offices on Matthew Parker Street with the lease coming up. “The rent is astronomical,” they say. A member of the party’s board says there have been open discussions about alternatives, including long-time party donor Lord (Michael) Spencer buying a building nearby and letting CCHQ rent some floors “on mates’ rates”. A senior Tory source says: “It feels like the end of an era leaving there. But we need to make sure we still have alternative offices to look like a credible operation.”

In a speech to CCHQ Badenoch had strong critiques of the attitudes of some within the operation.

“The key message that she gave to the team was that this is not about the Conservative Party, this is about serving the country by the conservative mission,” one shadow cabinet minister says. “If the conservative mission is not one that motivates you, well then we need to find people that are fundamentally motivated by wanting conservative values and principles to succeed.”

Loto’s ultimate vision is to prove both that the party has changed and fulfill the public’s desire for something new. By the next election, those in the party think Labour will have had four years to fail to show they are that new thing, while Reform will need to convince people they are serious.

“People are operating on different timetables,” concludes a senior Tory when asked to assess her first 100 days.

“It's that tension between those timelines that I think is a big challenge,” a shadow cabinet minister agrees, of marrying deep-thinking with quick-moving, “and I think it would be a challenge for anybody that took on that role”.

“But with donors hemorrhaging, she could find herself in trouble,” the senior Tory emphasises. Badenoch and her circle believe she has four years to execute her Three, Five strategy. “Some people think she’s got four months.”

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