Kemi Badenoch and the Art of Political Amnesia

Kemi Badenoch’s immigration “truth” is anything but, as she rewrites history to dodge responsibility for Conservative chaos.

It takes a special kind of audacity to admit that your party was a shambles on immigration, claim you’re the person to fix it despite presiding over the disaster, and then spend the rest of a speech blaming everyone and everything except yourself, wouldn’t you say? Well, not according to Kemi Badenoch, the newly minted leader of the Conservative Party, who, fresh off a humiliating electoral wipeout in July, has decided that it’s time to “tell the truth” about immigration.

Except, spoiler alert: it’s not the truth.

What Badenoch delivered wasn’t a thoughtful, reflective critique of migration policy but a rambling exercise in blame-shifting, designed to stoke outrage and distract from her own party’s abysmal track record. This is the same Conservative Party that spent 14 years making migration policy increasingly incoherent, and yet Badenoch wants us to believe Labour—the government of just five months—are the villains of the piece.

So, with that said, I would suggest getting a cup of coffee or tea ready and making yourself comfortable because there is a lot to unpack here.

“Mass Migration” and the Myth of Overburdened Services

Badenoch opens with the obligatory hand-wringing about immigration being “too high” and reducing “the quality of life for people already here.” She says public services can’t cope and integration is impossible at the current pace of migration.

Let’s pause here for a second.

Public services are struggling not because of migrants but because of 14 years of Tory underfunding and mismanagement. The NHS is chronically short of staff, schools are stretched to breaking point, and social housing is virtually non-existent—not because migrants use these services but because the Conservatives didn’t invest in them.

Consider the NHS first. It has been crippled by budget cuts, with services being rationed, waiting lists skyrocketing, and staff morale plummeting. Successive Tory governments have failed to invest adequately in healthcare infrastructure, training, or recruitment, leaving critical gaps that migrants have stepped in to fill.

The same story unfolds in education. Schools across the UK are overstretched due to chronic underfunding, teacher shortages, and a lack of resources. Yet, Badenoch would have us believe migrants are to blame. In reality, many migrant families contribute to these systems, not just through the taxes they pay but also by becoming teachers, support staff, and active members of the school community. The idea that migrants are overwhelming schools ignores the fact that austerity-driven cuts have hollowed out education budgets, forcing schools to do more with less.

And then there’s housing. Social housing was decimated under the Conservatives, with affordable housing builds at a historic low and waiting lists at an all-time high. And no, this isn’t because migrants are taking all the homes—it’s because successive Tory governments have failed to build enough affordable housing while selling off existing stock. Migrants are not the ones who instituted right-to-buy policies or refused to replace the social homes sold off—they are simply caught in the same crisis facing millions of Britons.

In fact, migrants are often the ones propping up these services. NHS data shows that nearly 17% of its workforce are non-British nationals, and that number is even higher in key areas like social care. Without migrants, these services wouldn’t be creaking—they’d collapse entirely.

But don’t expect Badenoch to mention that. Instead, she peddles the same tired rhetoric about migrants exploiting public services. “Our welfare system is not an international welfare system,” she says, painting a picture of Britain as a hotel for freeloaders. Never mind that most migrants aren’t even eligible for benefits for years after arriving. It’s not the truth—it’s just a convenient lie designed to scapegoat migrants for the government’s own failings.

The Integration Red Herring

Badenoch says, “If immigration is too quick, there is no integration. The ties that bind us start to fray.” This would be a compelling point if it weren’t completely undermined by her own government’s policies while they were in power. For years, the Conservatives slashed funding for community programmes, English language classes, and initiatives designed to foster integration. They systematically dismantled the exact support structures that could make integration possible, doing everything short of putting up signs that say, “You’re on your own.” Initiatives that promote cultural understanding and cohesion have been starved of resources, replaced instead with a hostile environment that tells migrants they are not welcome.

Integration doesn’t happen by magic. It requires investment, structured support, and a government willing to see migrants as people with the potential to enrich society, not problems to be managed. Badenoch’s attempt to frame frayed “ties that bind” as a migration issue rather than the result of deliberate Tory neglect is disingenuous. The truth is that her own party's policies have actively undermined integration, creating barriers instead of bridges. That Badenoch fails to acknowledge this speaks volumes about where the real issues lie.

Blame the Judges, Blame the ECHR, Blame Everyone Else

Badenoch declares it’s “nonsense” that “judges deem safe countries to be unsafe” and bemoans “loopholes wilfully exploited by opportunists.” She also promises to review the UK’s membership of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), as though withdrawing from it would suddenly make deportation planes fly faster.

Let’s be clear: the ECHR is not the problem, nor has it ever been. It was the Conservative government’s policies—poorly conceived, legally dubious, and morally indefensible—that kept getting struck down in court. The Rwanda scheme, for instance, wasn’t blocked because of pesky judges being too woke; it was ruled unlawful because it was an unworkable, multi-million-pound fiasco (£600m to be exact), one that lacked basic adherence to international law and completely disregarded human rights. Judges didn't “deem safe countries to be unsafe” out of spite—they did so because the government's plan lacked even the most rudimentary safeguards for vulnerable people.

The notion that scrapping the ECHR would fix these issues is ludicrous. The ECHR provides essential human rights protections that keep the government accountable, ensuring that decisions affecting people's lives meet a minimum standard of decency and legality. Without these checks, the government would be free to implement policies that are both reckless and inhumane, as evidenced by the repeated failures of their immigration schemes. The idea that the ECHR is some kind of obstacle to progress is a cynical misrepresentation; it’s there to prevent abuses of power, not to hinder well-conceived, lawful action.

What Badenoch is really saying is that she wants fewer checks on government power. She’s not interested in fixing the system; she’s interested in bulldozing legal protections that hold her party’s authoritarian instincts in check. She doesn’t want accountability; she wants carte blanche to enact policies without regard for legality or morality. It’s not about improving the system—it’s about removing any obstacle that dares to call out their incompetence and cruelty for what it is.

The Fantasy of a Migration Cap

Badenoch’s pièce de résistance is her promise of a “strict numerical cap” on migration. She doesn’t say what that cap might be because, let’s face it, the last time the Conservatives tried this, it was David Cameron’s infamous “tens of thousands” pledge—a goal they missed every single year because it was, frankly, fantasy.

Migration caps ignore economic realities. The UK is in desperate need of workers in multiple sectors—sectors that the government itself has identified as facing critical shortages. Labour shortages in key industries like agriculture, social care, and hospitality aren’t going to magically resolve themselves if you clamp down on work visas. Agriculture, as an example, relies heavily on seasonal migrant workers; without them, crops rot in the fields. In social care, where vacancies are already at record highs, fewer migrant workers will mean even more strain on an already struggling system—leading to worse outcomes for some of the most vulnerable people in society.

In hospitality, which is reeling from post-Brexit workforce issues, businesses are struggling to stay afloat without the steady supply of migrant labour they once had. These industries don’t need fewer workers; they need more, and they need them fast. The reality is that migration is not an abstract policy choice—it’s an economic necessity. The idea that simply cutting numbers will improve life for British workers is not only wrong, it’s dangerously simplistic. The labour market needs people, and British-born workers are either not available or not willing to fill many of these roles.

If anything, the attempt to cap migration without addressing the root causes of labour shortages will exacerbate existing economic problems. Costs will rise, services will decline, and the knock-on effects will hit everyone. But that’s a tomorrow problem for Badenoch, whose main concern is pandering to voters who think fewer migrants will mean more jobs (it won’t).

Something to keep in mind is that net migration figures reflect more than just economic migrants; they include international students, family reunifications, and asylum seekers—people who contribute culturally and economically in myriad ways. By focusing purely on an arbitrary cap, Badenoch reduces complex human realities to numbers on a spreadsheet. This approach isn’t about pragmatic governance; it’s about creating the illusion of control, even when it’s clear that the government has repeatedly failed to meet their own targets.

“This Country Is Not a Dormitory”

Badenoch’s speech reaches peak dog-whistling when she declares, “This country is not a dormitory or a hotel; it is our home.” This is classic Conservative populism, designed to paint migrants as transient, disloyal, and unworthy of the same rights as “real” Britons.

It’s also complete nonsense. Many migrants come to the UK not to pass through but to settle, contribute, and build a future. Migrants are homeowners, business owners, taxpayers, and active community members. They send their children to local schools, work in key sectors, and enrich cultural life. Suggesting otherwise isn’t just inaccurate—it’s insulting and reductive. This oft-repeated narrative ignores the countless migrants who have made the UK their home, many of whom have invested their livelihoods, skills, and aspirations into making the country a better place.

And while Badenoch lectures us on “values, customs, and institutions,” she conveniently ignores that those values include fairness, decency, and compassion—qualities very notably absent from her speech. The very idea that migrants are somehow separate from the fabric of British society flies in the face of the reality of countless individuals who have helped build and sustain communities across the UK. Whether in healthcare, education, or entrepreneurship, migrants are not just part of the story—they are integral to it. To dismiss them as transient is to wilfully ignore their contributions and reduce their humanity to a talking point.

Blaming Labour for Tory Failures

Finally, the sheer gall of Badenoch to pin all this on a Labour government that’s been in power since July is astounding. She points to rising Channel crossings and claims Labour has “no serious plan” to tackle illegal migration. This from a party that spent hundreds of millions on the Rwanda scheme, achieved precisely nothing, yet still thinks it was a good idea. The Rwanda scheme was an embarrassment, a wasteful, legally dubious exercise that did absolutely nothing to address the complexities of modern migration but succeeded in turning the UK into a global symbol of cruelty. To pin the rise in Channel crossings on Labour is another desperate attempt to shift blame by Badenoch, ignoring that it was under the Conservatives’ watch that these crossings began to surge, fuelled by policies that closed safe legal routes and created a hostile environment without offering any real solutions.

Badenoch also attacks Labour for suspending reforms like raising the income threshold for family visas. What she doesn’t mention is that such reforms often hurt British citizens, separating families and creating hardship for people who simply want to live with their loved ones. The income threshold is not some benign, bureaucratic hurdle—it has been a punitive barrier that has torn families apart, preventing British citizens from bringing their spouses or children to live with them because they don’t earn enough. It’s a policy that has disproportionately affected working-class people and ethnic minorities, exacerbating inequalities that the Conservatives claim to care about fixing. To suggest that raising the threshold again is a solution is to double down on cruelty while ignoring the human cost.

Labour’s immigration strategy isn’t perfect, but in just five months, they’ve done more to address systemic issues than the Tories managed in 14 years.

“Telling the Truth” While Avoiding Accountability

Badenoch closes by claiming she wants to “tell the truth” and rebuild trust between the Conservatives and the public. But the real truth is this: the Conservatives had 14 years to get immigration right.

They failed.

Repeatedly.

Spectacularly.

This country’s immigration system isn’t broken because of Labour, migrants, or judges. It’s broken because successive Tory governments treated it as a PR exercise rather than a complex issue requiring nuance, compassion, and competence. Instead of investing in solutions, they invested in slogans—“taking back control,” “stop the boats,” “hostile environment,” and “tens of thousands”—that made for great red-meat and headlines for their base but disastrous, dangerous policies. These slogans were nothing more than empty promises, used purely to distract from a lack of actionable, evidence-based strategy.

The Conservatives didn’t fail due to external factors; they failed because they never treated immigration with the seriousness it deserves. They poured money into futile vanity projects like the Rwanda scheme, stoked fears about migration, and demonised asylum seekers rather than creating a fair and functional system. It was easier to scapegoat migrants and blame the courts or Brussels than to engage with the economic realities and human complexities of migration. They consistently chose performative toughness over genuine problem-solving, and the results have been predictably dire.

Badenoch’s speech offers absolutely nothing new—just the same scapegoating and dog whistles we’ve heard for years. The Conservatives had their chance to build a humane, effective immigration policy that worked for both migrants and citizens. Instead, they chose to make migrants the enemy, diverting attention from their own failures. The truth Badenoch is desperate to avoid is that the Tories have failed because they never wanted a solution—they wanted a convenient distraction. And now, Badenoch wants us to pretend that these failures are somehow someone else’s fault.

The real truth is that after 14 years of Tory chaos, Kemi Badenoch isn’t offering a solution—she’s just rearranging the deckchairs on a sinking ship.