Robert Jenrick and Kemi Badenoch will battle it out to be the next leader of the Conservative Party after James Cleverly was eliminated from the race.
Tory MPs held a final vote on Wednesday to reduce the field to a final two, who will then go to a ballot of Conservative members.
After picking up 42 votes in the final round of voting, Ms Badenoch re-established herself as the favourite after lagging behind in previous rounds.
Robert Jenrick, her close rival on the right, picked up one vote shy of Ms Badenoch, while Mr Cleverly – who was seen as a unifying candidate – won the backing of 37 MPs.
The selection of Ms Badenoch and Mr Jenrick means the Conservative Party is heading towards the right and that immigration – and the UK’s membership of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) – will be at the top of the agenda.
Mr Jenrick said he was “delighted to have got so much support from parliamentary colleagues today”.
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James Cleverly eliminated in Tory race
He told Sky News’ Sophy Ridge he believed his message of fixing the NHS, growing the economy and reducing immigration had struck a chord with MPs.
“On each of these areas, I’ve got a real plan,” he said.
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“I don’t trade in platitudes. I have a plan as to how we provide serious, competent leadership for our party and ultimately for our country.”
This contest could become unpleasant quite quickly
The Conservative leadership contest is no longer a battle for the direction of the party.
By picking Kemi Badenoch and Robert Jenrick, this has pivoted from a contest about the future direction of the party to one that turns on two different visions of a Tory future on the right of British politics.
The ejection of James Cleverly – who was frontrunner just yesterday – stunned the party. Nobody has yet admitted to whether his defeat took place because of a miscalculation over vote lending.
However people saw Cleverly on the terrace and later for a time at the Boris Johnson book launch – a period the other campaign were hitting the phones to firm up support.
It is still too close to call who will win between Ms Badenoch and Mr Jenrick as they go through to the final round and submit themselves to the judgement of 170,000 Tory members.
However, Ms Badenoch now appears to have the edge.
The last Tory members poll for YouGov by Sky News puts her four percentage points ahead of her rival in a head to head contest – not much more than the margin of error, but this was taken before her well-received conference speech.
In the final round of voting she was suddenly out in front amongst MPs – when the suggestion had been that they might try and keep her off the ballot.
This puts to bed the suggestion that too many MPs worry that her regular incendiary and unpredictable comments bar her from the top job.
Mr Jenrick will now want this race to turn on immigration .
Team Jenrick say he wants to leave ECHR and she “wants to remain” and that his opponent wants to leave.
Team Badenoch says that misrepresents her – her more nuanced position is that she is willing to leave if necessary, but only after a review.
Other clear dividing lines are yet to emerge, however. The risk that a contest based around personalities becomes quite personal – and unpleasant – quite quickly.
It is not a contest anyone could have predicted.
Ms Badenoch said the reason she had performed the best in the final round of voting was because “people have a lot of faith in my approach”…that you start with principles first and then policy”.
Mr Cleverly’s elimination from the race came as a surprise after he rallied in the previous round of voting following what was considered to be a strong performance at the Conservative Party conference.
Image: Kemi Badenoch has established herself as the frontrunner after lagging behind in previous rounds.
Political reporter Alix Culbertson, who was in the room as the result was announced, said “disbelief resounded around the room” after it was confirmed the former home secretary would not be in the final two.
Following the result Mr Cleverly posted on X: “I’m grateful for the support I’ve received on this campaign from colleagues, party members and the public.
“Sadly it wasn’t to be. We are all Conservatives, and it’s important the Conservative Party unites to take on this catastrophic Labour government.”
It came after Tom Tugendhat, the former security minister who was running from the centrist wing of the party, was knocked out of the raceafter receiving the least votes from MPs on Tuesday.
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The result marks a comeback for Ms Badenoch, who while starting as the favourite in the early stages of the contest, was later pursued by Mr Jenrick who overtook her in the first, second and third MPs’ ballot.
Both candidates faced criticism for comments they made during the party conference.
Britain’s membership of the ECHR is likely to be at the forefront at the debate between the two frontrunners, with Mr Jenrick – who has already challenged his rival to a debate – advocating that the UK leave the convention.
Ms Badenoch’s position is that she wants a review of the ECHR and would be willing to leave it if necessary.
Asked whether the race was likely to get “dirty” and if he could guarantee a “clean contest”, Mr Jenrick told Sophy Ridge: “That’s the way I fought this campaign now for three months.
Image: Robert Jenrick has made leaving the ECHR central to his campaign.
“I’m a collegiate person, but I also want to provide direction for this party,” he said. “We need to be more Conservative. We need to ensure that we occupy that common ground of British politics once more.”
On the issue of the ECHR, Ms Badenoch said making it the sole focus of the debate would be a mistake.
“What I talked about in my conference speech and when I launched my campaign is we need to talk about everything,” she told reporters in Westminster.
“It can’t just be about one little part of immigration policy – we need to lower immigration, that’s part of the story, but just talking about the ECHR is going to shut down the conversation that we need to have with the entire country.”
The party membership vote will close at 5pm on Thursday 31 October. The winner, who will become leader of the party and the Opposition to the Labour government, will be announced on Saturday 2 November.
It is “shameful” that black boys growing up in London are “far more likely” to die than white boys, Metropolitan Police chief Sir Mark Rowley has told Sky News.
Sir Mark, who came out of retirement to become head of the UK’s largest police force in 2022, said: “We can’t pretend otherwise that we’ve got a history between policing and black communities where policing has got a lot wrong.
“And we get a lot more right today, but we do still make mistakes. That’s not in doubt. I’m being as relentless in that as it can be.”
He said the “vast majority” of the force are “good people”.
However, he added: “But that legacy, combined with the tragedy that some of this crime falls most heavily in black communities, that creates a real problem because the legacy creates concern.”
Sir Mark, who also leads the UK’s counter-terrorism policing, said it is “not right” that black boys growing up in London “are far more likely to be dead by the time they’re 18” than white boys.
“That’s, I think, shameful for the city,” he admitted.
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Police chase suspected phone thief
Baroness Casey was commissioned in 2021 to look into the Met Police after serving police officer Wayne Couzens abducted, raped and murdered Sarah Everard.
She pinned the primary blame for the Met’s culture on its past leadership and found that stop and search and the use of force against black people was excessive.
At the time, Sir Mark, who had been commissioner for six months when the report was published, said he would not use the labels of institutionally racist, institutionally misogynistic and institutionally homophobic, which Casey insisted the Met deserved.
However, London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who helped hire Sir Mark – and could fire him – made it clear the commissioner agreed with Baroness Casey’s verdict.
After the report was released, Sir Mark said “institutional” was political language so he was not going to use it, but he accepted “we have racists, misogynists…systematic failings, management failings, cultural failings”.
A few months after the report, Sir Mark launched a two-year £366m plan to overhaul the Met, including increased emphasis on neighbourhood policing to rebuild public trust and plans to recruit 500 more community support officers and an extra 565 people to work with teams investigating domestic violence, sexual offences and child sexual abuse and exploitation.
Watch the full interview on Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips from 8.30am on Sunday.
Labour’s largest union donor, Unite, has voted to suspend Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner over her role in the Birmingham bin strike row.
Members of the trade union, one of the UK’s largest, also “overwhelmingly” voted to “re-examine its relationship” with Labour over the issue.
They said Ms Rayner, who is also housing, communities and local government secretary, Birmingham Council’s leader, John Cotton, and other Labour councillors had been suspended for “bringing the union into disrepute”.
There was confusion over Ms Rayner’s membership of Unite, with her office having said she was no longer a member and resigned months ago and therefore could not be suspended.
But Unite said she was registered as a member. Parliament’s latest register of interests had her down as a member in May.
The union said an emergency motion was put to members at its policy conference in Brighton on Friday.
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Unite is one of the Labour Party’s largest union donors, donating £414,610 in the first quarter of 2025 – the highest amount in that period by a union, company or individual.
The union condemned Birmingham’s Labour council and the government for “attacking the bin workers”.
Mountains of rubbish have been piling up in the city since January after workers first went on strike over changes to their pay, with all-out strike action starting in March. An agreement has still not been made.
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Rat catcher tackling Birmingham’s bins problem
Ms Rayner and the councillors had their membership suspended for “effectively firing and rehiring the workers, who are striking over pay cuts of up to £8,000”, the union added.
‘Missing in action’
General secretary Sharon Graham told Sky News on Saturday morning: “Angela Rayner, who has the power to solve this dispute, has been missing in action, has not been involved, is refusing to come to the table.”
She had earlier said: “Unite is crystal clear, it will call out bad employers regardless of the colour of their rosette.
“Angela Rayner has had every opportunity to intervene and resolve this dispute but has instead backed a rogue council that has peddled lies and smeared its workers fighting huge pay cuts.
“The disgraceful actions of the government and a so-called Labour council, is essentially fire and rehire and makes a joke of the Employment Relations Act promises.
“People up and down the country are asking whose side is the Labour government on and coming up with the answer not workers.”
Image: Piles of rubbish built up around Birmingham because of the strike over pay
Sir Keir Starmer’s spokesman said the government’s “priority is and always has been the residents of Birmingham”.
He said the decision by Unite workers to go on strike had “caused disruption” to the city.
“We’ve worked to clean up streets and remain in close contact with the council […] as we support its recovery,” he added.
A total of 800 Unite delegates voted on the motion.
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