'We can't pretend UK integration has worked', says Tory leadership hopeful Kemi Badenoch
3 August 2024, 10:05 | Updated: 3 August 2024, 10:48
Britain must stop pretending integration is working, Tory leadership candidate Kemi Badenoch has insisted, following a series of violent clashes after the Southport stabbings.
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The former business secretary - considered one of the front runners to lead her party - argued there had been a “culture of silence” on the effects of immigration.
Speaking to The Daily Telegraph, where she committed her party to "speak the truth" if she is elected leader, Ms Badenoch said we "can't just pretend" that there are no tensions between ethnic minorities and white British people.
She told the paper: “You look at all the tension that we’ve been seeing in the country over the last few days in Southport and Hartlepool, everybody’s quiet.
“They don’t want to upset the cultural establishment that wants to pretend that nothing is going on. They should be saying that we need a clearer strategy on integration, which we don’t have.
"We just pretend that … it’s a few bad apples, which is sometimes the case. But if you want to have a successful multiracial country, you need to make an effort to do that. You can’t just pretend that there are no tensions.
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Ms Badenoch set out her pitch to Conservative members to lead the party, telling voters she had experience in dealing with such situations, formerly as minister for local communities and local government, and having an immigrant background.
The violent clashes she was referring to came after the Southport stabbings on Monday where the suspect was identified as a 17-year-old born in Cardiff with Rwandan heritage.
A week of violence has followed with far-right demonstrators attacking mosques and police, as well as shouting “Stop the boats” and "Enough is enough".
Sunderland and Liverpool saw violence on Friday night, with protesters gathering outside Downing Street on Thursday.
Ms Badenoch is contending the leadership alongside James Cleverly, Tom Tugendhat, Robert Jenrick, Dame Priti Patel and Mel Stride.
Mr Jenrick has committed to reviving the Rwanda scheme if he became Tory leader and said he would be "open to" a cap restricting immigration to less than 10,000 people a year.
The Labour Government scrapped the plan to deport unauthorised migrants to the east African country after coming to office, and has said it cost £700 million in the last year alone.
Speaking at a campaign launch event in his Newark constituency on Friday afternoon, Mr Jenrick said large areas of the British state were "not working for the British people" and claimed the political system has appeared "either unwilling or unable" to do the "basic duty" to "secure our borders".
Asked to put a number on his proposed immigration cap, Mr Jenrick said: "I said that it would be in the tens of thousands. I'm open to it being less.
"But the key thing is that Parliament decides the cap and every Member of Parliament votes for it, so you can hold them to account."
He added that he would "hope" to bring back the Rwanda scheme scrapped by the new Government, but this would be "four or five years away".
Mr Jenrick said his position on leaving the European Convention on Human Rights, an international agreement which underpins UK human rights law, was "crystal clear".
He has previously argued leaving the treaty would make it easier to deport migrants from the UK.
In an attempt to curry favour with grassroots Tory members, the leadership hopeful said he wanted to ensure they were able to choose candidates for elections again.
