Key events
Rachel Reeves given extra £3bn for budget after VAT error fixed
Mistakes in recent public finances data mean government borrowing has been overstated by a cumulative £3bn, the Office for National Statistics has announced. As Heather Stewart reports, in a fillip that gives Rachel Reeves a little bit more wriggle room in her November budget, the ONS said its estimates of public borrowing had been out by £200m-£500m a month since January.
People who back leaving ECHR know less about what it actually does than those in favour of staying, poll suggests
Here is more from the YouGov polling report showing that that people in favour of leaving the ECHR know less about what it actually does than those in favour of staying in. In his YouGov write-up, Matthew Smith says:
There is virtually no difference in proclaimed familiarity with the EHCR between those who want to remain members and those who want to withdraw, while current Labour voters are more likely than others to claim knowledge and Tory voters somewhat less likely.
When tested on their actual knowledge, the public are most likely to correctly identify that the right not to be tortured (59%) and the right to a fair trial (56%) are covered by the ECHR, although these are the only two of the eight true or false questions that most Britons got right.
Just 38% know freedom of speech is an area covered by the ECHR, and only 37% know that a right to free healthcare, and 22% the right to migrate, are not.
Only 24% correctly identified that the ECHR is not an EU body, while a similar number (26%) are right that countries have leeway in the interpretation/implementation of ECHR provisions. Just 15% correctly say that the European Court of Human Rights cannot overrule or annul national laws (they can only find them to be in violation and require the state to remedy the situation).
The results show that those Britons who want to remain in the ECHR are generally more likely to answer this battery of questions correctly – although in most cases fewer than half on both sides of the argument gave the correct answer.
Rafael Behr’s take on the Conservative party conference is well worth reading. Here is his conclusion.
Badenoch has spent a year immersed in pseudo-intellectual laundering of radical nationalist positions, all the while imagining she was heading to some other, more sophisticated destination. She really thought she was rehabilitating the Tories, but she has reduced them to a low-wattage thinktank attached to a warehouse storing future parliamentary candidates for Farage.
For the remnant of moderate centre-right Conservatives hoping for some pathway back to credibility, Badenoch’s leadership has been the worst of all worlds. Her claim to be thoughtful was an affectation, squandering time when real thought might have been applied to the hard questions she has avoided. She discredited the idiom of serious Conservatism by appropriating it for the shallowest agenda. She understood the need for a boundary between traditional Toryism and populist demagoguery but lacked the clarity of thought, strategic acumen and political courage to enforce one. She has accelerated the dissolution of her party’s identity by asserting it in terms that no casual voter will understand. In the post-Conservative climate of British politics, they won’t even notice.
And here is the full article.
Britons back staying in ECHR by 46% to 29%, poll suggests
The most important policy announcement of the week was Kemi Badenoch’s declaration that the Tories are now committed to taking the UK out of the European convention on human rights. Even though polling suggests that the party has very little chance of winning the next election, this means both major rightwing parties in the UK (Reform UK and the Conservative party) are now firmly behind ECHR. And, with Badenoch declaring that future election candidates will have to support the policy, this position is likely to be locked in for some time to come.
But the voters as a whole are not in favour, according to new polling from YouGov. In his write-up for YouGov, Matthew Smith says:
A new YouGov survey shows that the public are generally opposed to leaving the ECHR, with 46% saying we should remain a member compared to 29% saying we should withdraw from it – the remaining 24% are unsure.
While seven in ten of those who currently intend to vote for Reform UK back withdrawal (72%), this falls to a much lower 44% of those who back the Conservatives, although this is still the plurality preference.
By contrast, 82% of current Labour voters want to remain within the Convention, as do 76% of Lib Dems and 85% of Greens.
The polling also shows that, while more than half of Britons say they know not very much or nothing about the ECHR, the people in favour of leaving are more likely to be ignorant about the convention than those in favour of staying. Smith says:
Those Britons who want to remain in the ECHR are generally more likely to answer this battery of questions [about what the ECHR says] correctly – although in most cases fewer than half on both sides of the argument gave the correct answer.
Tory chair Kevin Hollinrake dismisses report saying Badenoch’s shadow ministers plotting to force her out
Kevin Hollinrake, the Conservative party chair, has dismissed reports suggesting Kemi Badenoch will be replaced within a year.
Asked if Badenoch would be addressing the Tory conference as party leader next autumn, he replied: “Absolutely, yes.”
In an interview on the Today programme Emma Barnett asked how he could say that in the light of reports, like one in today’s Times saying, that that shadow ministers are already plotting a leadership challenge.
The Times story says the shadow cabinet is split between those who favour a leadership challenge in November, when Badenoch will have been leader for a year, meaning the rule allowing MPs to demand a confidence vote kicks in, and others who want to wait until next year’s elections.
But even those willing to give Badenoch more time mostly do not believe she will survive bad results in those elections, the Times suggests.
The Times story, based on reporting in the Times’ new political podcast, The State of It, says Robert Jenrick is one of those willing to wait. It says:
Jenrick is said to be biding his time, believing that his best chance to take over will come if the Tories lose a swathe of council seats to Reform next year.
One ally said that he was not “mad enough to do a Burnham” — a reference to Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of Greater Manchester who was highly critical of Sir Keir Starmer — and would remain outwardly loyal to Badenoch until after May …
Another ally of Jenrick said that “he has the numbers” — a reference to the 36 letters needed to precipitate a contest. “The best result here for Kemi and for Rob if things don’t improve is a bloodless coup,” one shadow minister said. “The last thing we need is more Tory psychodrama.”
Hollinrake said he wanted the party’s poll ratings to improve. Asked how long Badenoch had to turn things around, he replied:
As far as I’m concerned, she’s all the time she needs.
I don’t think it’ll take years to change the poll ratings. I think over the coming weeks and months that will happen.
Kemi Badenoch has got the backbone to do what needs to be done with this country. She’s got the strength of character. She says what she means, and means what she says – in total contrast to what you’ve seen from Keir Starmer who’s a very weak leader with no backbone.
He also said that in the last parliament the party changed leader too often.
I think that was very unpopular the public. It looks like we were very internalised in terms of our thinking, very introspective. I think that’s the wrong thing.
Labour and Lib Dems dismiss Badenoch’s claim that Tories can be trusted on economy
‘Not credible’ is also the thrust of the Labour and Liberal Democrat reponses to Kemi Badenoch’s proposed economic “golden rule” – that at least half of all money a Tory government saves through cuts would be used for deficit reduction. (Gordon Brown also had a “golden rule”, but his was different.) Donna Ferguson has details of the Badenoch proposal here.
A Labour spokesperson said:
Kemi Badenoch has some brass neck. It’s astounding that her latest speech still contains no apology for the Conservatives crashing the economy …
The Tories’ fantasy public spending ‘savings’ are done on the back of the same fag packet Nigel Farage has been writing on.
And a Liberal Democrat spokesperson said:
The idea that the public would now trust the Conservative party with the economy is laughable. From almost crashing our economy to leaving public services on their knees, the Conservatives have shown their economics is almost as bad as their spelling.
Labour says Badenoch’s further education promises worthless because apprenticeship starts ‘collapsed’ under Tories
The Conservatives are proposing to cut the number of students going to university so that they can save £3bn a year which they can spend on apprenticeships. This would double the apprenticeships budget.
In her speech, Kemi Badenoch will says she knows from personal experience the value of apprenticeships. She will say:
Nearly one in three graduates see no economic return, and every year taxpayers are writing off over £7bn in unpaid student loans.
Wasted money, wasted talent.
A rigged system propping up low-quality courses, while people can’t get high-quality apprenticeships that lead to real jobs.
This is personal for me.
A lot of people know I did two degrees.
One in engineering. One in law.
But while I can’t remember how to do parallel integration.
I can remember how to fix a broken computer.
Which I learnt on my apprenticeship.
We need more apprenticeships.
I was working with adults.
I was paying my own way.
And it gave me self confidence in a way my university degrees never did.
And unlike my subsequent university degree, I wasn’t still paying off my debts in my early 30s.
Spending on apprenticeships is popular with voters. That is one reason why Keir Starmer also used his party conference speech to announce a tilt in higher and further education policy, giving apprenticeships more priority.
Labour says the Tories have no credibility on this topic. This is what the party said about the Badenoch plan briefed overnight. A Labour spokesperson said:
Kemi Badenoch’s pledge isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. Under the Tories, apprenticeship starts and completions collapsed, and instead of supporting universities, they waged divisive culture wars – treating students as political pawns rather than investing in education for public good.
This Labour government has changed course. We’ve stabilised university finances and opened up access to apprenticeships for thousands more young people, with confirmed increases in starts over the past year.
Starmer says Jenrick is ‘hard to take seriously’ after Birmingham comments
Keir Starmer is on a visit to India. Speaking to reporters on the flight to Mumbai, he had time to take a swipe at Robert Jenrick.
Here are some pictures from the Starmer trip.
Kemi Badenoch criticised for ‘nonsensical’ plan to cut student numbers by 100,000
Good morning. Kemi Badenoch is giving her first main speech to a Conservative party conference as leader. There are many people who assume it will be her last.
(She did speak on Sunday, on her plan to leave the European convention on human rights [ECHR], but the Wednesday speech closing conference is always the biggie.)
The Tories face an existential challenge from Reform UK. While Badenoch has tried to differentiate the party from Reform UK, mainly be stressing her commitment to fiscal responsibility and cutting public spending, her main rival, Robert Jenrick, seems to be adopting the opposite approach – essentially adopting Nigel Farage’s outlook wholesale.
In her speech today Badenoch will announce a new economic “golden rule” that she will present as evidence that a Conservative government would bring down government borrowing. It is a policy that the Tories might have embraced in the era of David Cameron and George Osborne. But what is much more interesting is how Badenoch is, in many areas, trampling all over Cameron-era Conservatism. We’ve seen this in the decision to proposing leaving the ECHR, repealing the Climate Change Act (essentially Cameron legislation, passed by Gordon Brown, as Michael Heseltine pointed out yesterday) and slashing aid spending to its lowest level on record.
And in her speech today Badenoch will bury another Cameron policy. His government lifted the cap on the number of students allowed to go to unversity, which opened up higher education to more young people and led to university expansion. Today Badenoch will propose bringing it back, cutting the number of people going to university by around 100,000 a year.
In a news release explaining why, the Conservative party says:
While many young people still benefit from university, too many are being pushed towards a degree as the only route to success, even as evidence has mounted that for too many it leads to poor job prospects and high debt …
Analysis by the Institute of Fiscal Studies finds that “total returns [on going to university] will be negative for around 30% of both men and women”. Many graduates earn so little they never repay fully their student loans, leaving the taxpayer to cover over £7bn in unpaid debt every year in England alone …
We will protect the interests of taxpayers and students by introducing caps on funded courses that consistently lead to poor graduate outcomes. We will introduce controls on student numbers in specific subject groups, so the taxpayer is not left subsidising courses which are leading to low graduate earnings or limited career prospects …
Number controls would apply in every subject group, such as creative arts, languages or sports science, and would be progressively reduced in subject groups where we see the greatest losses for taxpayers and students. This would reduce the number of annual university places by approximately 100,000 and save over £3bn in loan repayment losses that are currently written off each year as public spending.
The Tories say they would use the savings to double apprenticeship funding.
The University and College Union has described this as “economically illiterate”. In a statement, Jo Grady, the UCU general secretary, said:
This is an economically illiterate policy; no country has ever grown by slashing university places. Nonsensical ideas such as this come as no surprise from the party that crashed the economy, and fortunately, have no hope of being enacted, as the Tories will not be winning an election anytime soon.
The way to deal with the student debt burden is through a return to public funding, this could be paid for with a wealth tax, so those who benefit the most from getting a degree contribute more.
Here is the timetable of events at the Conservative conference.
10am: Matt Vickers, deputy chair of the party, hosts a panel on the 2026 local elections.
10.30am: Mims Davies, the shadow Welsh secretary, Andrew Bowie, the shadow Scottish secretary, and Alex Burghart, the shadow Northern Ireland secretary speak on a panel about the governance of the UK.
11.15am: Kemi Badenoch delivers her speech.
Also today, Keir Starmer is on a visit in India. And this morning John Swinney, the Scottish first minister, is holding a press conference to mark the publication of a paper about independence.
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