Grassroots Conservatives are planning a move to dislodge Kemi Badenoch after recent local elections left the party’s activist base depleted and depressed.
Association chairmen are understood to be considering a confidence motion against the Tory leader, similar to the pressure put on Theresa May to quit in 2019.
Several told The Times they wanted to act as MPs were “willing but unable” to remove Badenoch, although a growing number of shadow ministers privately think she should go.
Badenoch is protected from a leadership challenge until November. The threshold for a confidence vote by the party’s 120 MPs has been raised from 10 per cent to one third.
However, members of the Conservatives’ national convention said they were examining how to make the anger of the voluntary party known, in a bid to head off what they see as inevitable further losses in next year’s elections.
One said: “Speaking to colleagues, I think they’re in a pretty similar place. This is worse than 2013, when Ukip caused immense damage in the local elections. We’re worried we’ll get to a point where the party at a local level stops being viable.
“The problem is
Kemi Badenoch. She’s just not up to it. MPs can’t challenge her for a year but there is a straightforward mechanism we can use.”
Others who spoke to The Times said it was “an option on the table” and “being discussed by a growing number within the voluntary party”.
A similar plan was hatched in 2019, after May won a confidence vote from MPs in December the previous year.
Ten per cent of the party’s national convention, known colloquially as its internal parliament, are required to back a motion for it to be formally considered. The convention is made up of about 650 association chairs, plus area and regional officers.
While the wording of a motion has not been agreed, sources said the intention was to censure Badenoch and call for an emergency meeting to discuss her leadership and a confidence vote.
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Bad news for Kemi Badenoch as Tories fall behind Lib Dems in polls
David Campbell Bannerman, chair of the Conservative Democratic Organisation, said: “We don’t have serious leadership. Everyone thinks she’ll go. My view is we don’t have time to just sink and sink and sink. We’ve got to act now.”
He said “what’s killing us is complacency” and that Tory activists were prepared to wait for a fully fledged manifesto, but desperate for more clarity on policy.
He added: “No one’s going to care about another change. All they care about is the Conservatives having effective leadership and fighting back and holding Labour to account.
“Unless we get serious about leadership, we won’t be able to recover. Another year of this and we may not be here any more.”
Privately, shadow ministers and Tory MPs have been plotting Badenoch’s removal more fervently in the weeks since the Conservatives lost 16 councils and 674 councillors.
Badenoch said in the aftermath she was “sorry”, but maintained that it was unrealistic to expect her to have revived the party’s fortunes in just seven months.
She has sought to assuage colleagues’ concerns by saying that her attempts to renew and rebuild the party will take time.
James Cleverly, the former foreign secretary, has suggested the Tories must act as quickly as possible to win voters back over.
Speaking at a recent public affairs event, a source said he warned: “We didn’t realise Labour would implode so quickly and squander their honeymoon, before voters had flushed their anger at us out of their systems. We haven’t got the luxury of time to get our act together.”
A shadow cabinet minister also voiced fears sitting Tory councillors could defect en masse over the next 12 months to Reform, in the hope of holding their seats.
Prior to this month’s local elections, many of Badenoch’s critics believed their best chance of a putsch was in May 2026, in the expectation that the Tories will be wiped out in Wales, suffer in Scotland and struggle in local elections across England. They wanted her to “own” the result, and avoid appearing to have agitated against her too early in the parliament.
Senior Tories fear that they have continually underestimated the floor of support for the party. Some struggled to countenance polling behind Reform this time last year, now they fear they could soon sink further to draw level with the Greens.
Opinion polls have Reform on around 30 percent, Labour on 22 per cent and the Tories on 17 per cent, just ahead of the Lib Dems on 15 per cent, while the Greens have hovered at closer to 9 per cent.
After taking the parliamentary seat of Runcorn & Helsby on May 1, Reform is already fundraising for a by-election campaign in Hertsmere. There is no vacancy, as the seat is occupied by Oliver Dowden, the former deputy prime minister.
Reform insiders said it demonstrated their ambitions to gain more MPs, even though Dowden was relatively safe with a majority of 7,992 at the 2024 general election.
The possibility of future by-elections is also being considered by allies of
Boris Johnson, the former prime minister.
To win over members, Badenoch has launched a policy review commission to devise ideas. Three staff have been hired to oversee the programme of policy development, which includes working with shadow cabinet ministers and engaging with volunteers.
However, in a worrying sign of how engaged activists are, at this week’s shadow cabinet meeting Nigel Huddleston, the party’s co-chair, said that thousands had filled out a survey of members about what the Tories’ priorities should be — to the disappointment of some of those in the room, given that was just a fraction of members.
A Conservative source said: “Anyone who thinks that changing leader after six months will help needs to get real.
The Conservative Party suffered its worst-ever defeat last year and renewing the party from the ground up is going to take time.
“Kemi is doing the serious work to develop proper policy plans, rebuild CCHQ and hold this disastrous Labour government to account. She will keep touring the country to listen to the public outside the Westminster bubble, and work every single day to earn back their trust.”
Removing Badenoch would also carry
the risk of donors refusing to support the party. Lord Ashcroft, who has helped bankroll the party in past months, posted a stark warning on X this week: “If Kemi goes, I go.”
