Kemi Badenoch tops next Conservative Party leader poll

Survey of grassroots Tories ranked Business Secretary ahead of Penny Mordaunt and Suella Braverman

Kemi Badenoch has topped a poll of grassroots Tories on who should become the next party leader.
The Business Secretary pushed ahead of Penny Mordaunt and Suella Braverman with 38 per cent of the vote, according to a survey from the ConservativeHome website.
Ms Mordaunt, the Leader of the House of Commons, and Mrs Braverman, the former home secretary, trailed on 23 per cent and 14 per cent respectively.
All three women stood in the leadership race to succeed Boris Johnson in 2022, but were ultimately eliminated in a ballot of MPs before they could go before the membership.
No other MPs made it to double digits in the ConservativeHome poll.
James Cleverly, who has been grappling with the Rwanda deportation policy since he was moved to the Home Office in the autumn, came fourth with about 7 per cent of the vote.
He was followed by Tom Tugendhat, the Security Minister; Grant Shapps, the Defence Secretary; and Robert Jenrick, the former immigration minister.
Former Cabinet ministers Priti Patel and Simon Clarke, along with Esther McVey – the Minister without Portfolio and “common-sense tsar” – also made the top 10.
Nigel Farage was not eligible for the poll but nonetheless received 18 write-in votes. The former leader of UKIP has previously claimed that he could be in charge of the Conservative Party, which he left three decades ago, by 2026.
Mr Johnson, who was ousted as party leader and prime minister in the summer of 2022 as his government collapsed, received 16 write-in votes.
Ms Badenoch’s popularity appears to have rebounded since May, when Tory grassroots turned on her as she called off a “Brexit bonfire” to repeal thousands of EU laws by the end of the year.
In the months since, she has earned plaudits from Tory Right-wingers for her interventions on trans issues.
Ms Badenoch, who is also the Women and Equalities Minister, has warned that Britain is facing an “epidemic” of gay children being told they are transgender, labelling it a “new form of conversion therapy”.
She has also said that the law needs to change to protect single-sex spaces because there are more male predators than there are trans people.
The Business Secretary’s ranking marks a dramatic turn in fortunes since the last Tory leader poll from ConservativeHome two years ago, in which she was ranked 11th.
The survey placed Liz Truss in first place, followed by Rishi Sunak in second and Ms Mordaunt in third, mirroring the result when all three subsequently ran to replace Mr Johnson in June.
Ms Badenoch, who was backed by the veteran Cabinet minister Michael Gove, was eventually eliminated in the fourth round of voting after a surprise insurgent campaign.
She was also recently named “minister of the year” by ConservativeHome.
Ms Braverman, who was sacked by Mr Sunak in November following a series of controversies, and Mr Mordaunt, came in at second and third respectively.
In a separate ConservativeHome poll, Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg was crowned the most popular backbencher, beating Miriam Cates, the MP for Penistone and Stocksbridge, and Ms Braverman.