UK politics live: Kemi Badenoch insists she believes in maternity pay as Tory rivals jump on ‘excessive’ claim

Kemi Badenoch has downplayed the idea of quitting the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) as a solution to the UK’s migration challenges, suggesting it would not be her first step in addressing the issue.

In a video posted on X, she said: “A lot of people talk about leaving the ECHR as if it is a silver bullet. It’s not. Leaving the ECHR alone will not solve our immigration issues. It’s not even the most radical thing we need to do.

“We need a wholesale strategy that starts with thinking about what kind of country we want to be, who are we letting in, why are they here? How long are they going to be here for? Are they committed to our country? Do they want to be British?”

Following Canterbury MP Rosie Duffield’s resignation from the Labour Party, senior minister and Sir Keir Starmer ally Pat McFadden has expressed regret over her departure.

He told Sky News: “I regret that Rosie’s made this decision. It’s probably not a secret that she’s been unhappy for some time.”

When pressed on Ms Duffield’s claim that she is “ashamed” of the party, McFadden said: “Well, I’m not ashamed of the party. You know, we’ve got a new Labour government. We’ve got a big agenda ahead of us.”

Rosie Duffield has quit as a Labour MP, criticising leader Sir Keir Starmer’s plan to scrap winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners and also his decision to retain the two-child benefit cap for parents.

In a three-page letter, published in the Sunday Times, she also slammed his treatment of fellow MP Diane Abbot, as well as his “managerial style and technocratic approach.”

She plans to sit as an independent MP. Below is her letter in full.

James Cleverly is the preferred candidate to win the Tory leadership race amongst the British public, a new poll has shown - but a majority of respondents said they don’t know who they would support.

Asked which candidate would make the best prime minister, new polling by Techne put the former home secretary narrowly ahead of his rival candidates at 13 per cent support.

Our political correspondent Millie Cooke has the full story:

Penny Mordaunt said she will lead work to “restore the soul” of the Conservative Party and win back power.

After an introduction from party chairman Richard Fuller, during a session focusing on why the party lost the general election and how it can win again, Ms Mordaunt said: “The chairman has asked me to help us as a party reconnect with those that we serve and protect.”

The former leader of the Commons said that less than two per cent of the UK population are members of any political party.

Ms Mordaunt added: “So we will need the largest outreach programme any party has undertaken, and that is what I will prepare.

“Will you help restore the soul of this party, to place Britain’s values back at the heart of everything we do to earn back trust, approval from the public, and perhaps even pride? For without that, no policy or personality will matter.

“Do this well, then when the nation goes looking for those in tune with its values again, we will be there.”

Labour has hit out at Kemi Badenoch over her claims that current maternity pay is “excessive”.

Ellie Reeves, Labour’s chairwoman, said: “It is symptomatic of the Conservative Party as a whole that this is the kind of intervention that one of their leadership contenders is coming out with.

“The Tories and their continuity candidates are completely unserious about the problems they inflicted on the country over 14 years of chaos and decline.”

It has been more than two months since the Tories’ devastating result at the general election, but the blame game continues.

Former MP Penny Mordaunt has weighted in claiming that the Conservative Party lost the election because it no longer appeared to share a belief in values such as “courage, honour and trust”.

Speaking on the first day of the party’s conference in Birmingham, Ms Mordaunt listed a series of values that she believed the party and the country historically shared.

She said: “We value courage, endeavour, enterprise, service and duty, creativity and discovery, competence and skill, grit, determination, kindness, tolerance and freedom, cheerfulness, honour, valour, graft, integrity, trust.

“It was our belief in those values that enabled our greatest deeds and victories, and not just those at the ballot box.

“It was the British people’s belief in those values that removed us from government three months ago.”

Lord Daniel Hannan has urged Conservative Party activists to “make no mistake about the scale of the challenge” they face.

The peer began his Conservative Party Conference speech in Birmingham by reciting a verse from The Storm Cone by Rudyard Kipling: “This is the midnight, let no star delude us. Dawn is very far. This is the tempest long foretold, slow to make head but sure to hold.”

He said: “My friends, let’s be in no doubt about the magnitude of the challenge we face. We aspire to be the national party. It’s been our privilege to speak to and for the soul of the United Kingdom and yet in large parts of the nation we have no parliamentary representation.

“In one election we lost two thirds of our MPs, we lost all of our red wall seats, we now have one Conservative in the whole of the North East. We don’t have a single Conservative MP in Wales. Make no mistake about the scale of the challenge.”

He also told delegates and activists on Sunday: “There has not been a massive shift in the cultural values of the nation. I don’t know of anyone who voted to change governments because they thought that taxes and spending were too low and needed to go up a bit.

“I don’t know of anyone who voted for a change because they thought that prison sentencing was too lenient, sorry, was too tough and needed to be made more lenient. I don’t know of anyone who voted for that change because they believed that our border controls were too strict and that we needed more illegal immigration.”

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been branded the “patron saint of misery” by Conservative Party chairman Richard Fuller.

He told the party conference: “The Labour Party believe that a strong economy will come from the fortune-telling powers of the blessed Rachel, the patron saint of misery.

“But the truth is that Rachel Reeves is creating uncertainty that is harming growth, not helping.

“Will she approve new employment laws that could throttle small businesses? With Rachel Reeves, we don’t know.

“Will she stop families passing on their home, or their business, or their farm to their children? With Rachel Reeves, we don’t know.

“Will she hike taxes on pensions, on schools and on wealth creators? With Rachel Reeves, we don’t know. But here’s what we do know: with Rachel Reeves, pensioners freeze.”

Conservative Party chairman Richard Fuller has said that Conservative MPs appeared too divided and appeared self serving before they were defeated at the general election earlier this year.

Speaking from the main stage on the first day of the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham, Mr Fuller said he had been receiving feedback from members after the election. He said: “A leading theme is the performance of our parliamentary party following the election victory in 2019.

“You told us, as voters have told us, that the parliamentary party was divided, that we appeared self serving and self indulgent.

“You told us, as the voters told us, that our policies too frequently lack grip on the issues at hand, and that we had lost sight of the Conservative values that should have been our guide.

“And that the absence of clear sight to our principles encouraged factionalism across the parliamentary party, hampering any leaders’ focus on competent delivery, on the priorities that had drawn so many people to vote Conservative.”

Mr Fuller added: “I was a member of that parliament. I am accountable for those assessments of our performance. I am profoundly sorry to you, the members of the Conservative Party.”