Conference wrap: Conservatives 2026
Kemi Badenoch’s steadier leadership, The Right Way and a party still polling around 20 per cent
The Conservatives left Birmingham looking rather different from a year ago. Then the question was whether Kemi Badenoch would survive and whether Robert Jenrick would topple her; this time, with Jenrick gone, nobody serious expected a leadership contest. Badenoch has moved from approval ratings in the minus 30s to around net neutral in More in Common’s polling.
The party has not travelled as far. Sir John Curtice put it at around 20 per cent, up from about 17 a year ago but roughly four points below its 2024 result. Badenoch’s answer is The Right Way, a 95-page statement of principles echoing The Right Approach of Thatcher’s Conservatives in 1976, and a programme of tax cuts, welfare reform and higher defence spending.
The open question is the arithmetic: lower taxes, defence spending of 3 per cent of GDP by 2030 and a deficit cut of more than £35 billion, all at once. As the conference season closes, the danger for the Conservatives is mistaking their own improved mood for the mood of the country.
The full report · 22 pages, with every chart.
Get the full reportWhat we found
1. Badenoch’s centrepiece was a set of tax cuts aimed at homeowners and young workers
Inheritance tax would be substantially reduced, with favourable treatment for family homes passed to direct descendants, stamp duty on main homes would go, employer National Insurance would be halved for younger workers and the £100,000 childcare cliff edge removed. Labour will cast welfare cuts funding inheritance-tax cuts as a transfer from poorer households to wealthier ones, and with defence spending and deficit reduction also promised, welfare reform and a smaller state have to deliver very large sums.
2. Welfare reform is meant to make room for lower taxes and more defence
Helen Whately proposed reducing Universal Credit after six months for some unemployed claimants without a sufficient contribution record, with payments partly made through a “Back to Work” card restricting cash withdrawals and spending on alcohol, tobacco and gambling. Critics say benefits are already low, and because much economic inactivity is linked to ill health, the party will also need answers on occupational health, NHS treatment and employment support.
3. Griffith’s speech fell flat, but it carried a substantial deregulation programme
The Shadow Chancellor’s plans include tax simplification, backing Heathrow expansion, speeding up nuclear power, abolishing at least one tax at every Budget and replacing Section 106 and the Community Infrastructure Levy with a single developer charge. The party claims its changes could cut the cost of some new homes by up to £50,000, though a lower development cost need not mean the same cut in price, and E3G calculates that dropping the Future Homes Standard could add around £1,000 a year to occupants’ energy bills.
4. Badenoch ruled out a pact with Reform and drew a moral line against it
The party is competing hard for Reform voters on ECHR withdrawal, lower migration, welfare and criminal justice, but Badenoch said there would be no “Unite the Right” under her. She attacked questioning whether people are properly British because of their race or background, citing her own mixed-race children and attacks on Rishi Sunak and Bukayo Saka; the Financial Times called it a moral dividing line with Reform.
What’s in the report
- Conservative Party conference 2026 p. 3
- The Right Way p. 5
- Let’s talk economy p. 7
- Defence, a cost worth spending p. 9
- Tugendhat’s foreign plans p. 10
- Chris Philp p. 12
- Health p. 14
- The Clarkson factor p. 15
- The Birmingham tapestry p. 17
- Reframing Reform p. 18
- Kemi’s moment p. 19
- Conference round-up p. 21
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