Kemi’s loss is Reform’s gain

Danny Kruger has created a nightmare on Matthew Parker Street

This article was first published in The Critic. Everything I publish elsewhere is shared here, as a gift to the nation. But if you want the full picture become a paid subscriber. It’s a few quid a month; such is the price genius is reduced to.

As an engineer, Kemi Badenoch is no doubt familiar with how a Terrain Avoidance and Warning System functions; based on radio altimeter data and calculated terrain closure rates, it automatically alerts pilots with a distinct warning when their aircraft is approaching dangerously close to the ground.

If there is one fitted in CCHQ it must be screaming “TERRAIN, TERRAIN! PULL UP, PULL UP!” to anyone who is listening. If anyone is listening.

Today, Reform announced not only their biggest and most serious defection yet, but perhaps the first serious, credible one too; the Shadow Minister for Work and Pensions Danny Kruger. One of the party’s most intelligent figures, of some 20+ years’ service to the party, he summarised his reason for leaving as, simply, “The Conservative party is finished.”

So far, Tory defections have generally been bit-part players, also-rans or have beens. Jake Berry and Nadine Dorries may have served in government, but they are no longer MPs, nor are they considered serious figures. They are the journeymen of yesterday, rather than the stars of tomorrow; Kruger, however, fits strongly in the latter camp.

Kruger is certainly the most high-status defection, as the first sitting shadow minister to defect. But he is also widely considered one of the most thoughtful, serious and intellectually capable MPs in the party right now. He is not, by position or by nature, simply a backbencher, whose loss can be waved away with a dismissive hand.

Whilst he had not quite attained the status of intellectual lode-star, he was widely seen as part of a cadre of rising stars in the party who, along with figures like Katie Lam, Nick Timothy and Neil O’Brien, formed a nexus of hope for disenchanted conservatives still hoping the party could be made right, and made to fight. Unapologetically but never crassly right wing, the ex-Cameron speech writer had become a central voice in policy development on topics from immigration to assisted dying, where he has won plaudits for his eloquent, intelligent and principled criticism of Leadbeater’s Bill.

Less than two weeks ago, Kemi took to the airwaves to declare that “If people don’t like [the way I’m running the party], they’re welcome to leave”. It was a stupid and arrogant invitation, and there is some consolation that Kemi was doing the media round when this defection was announced. She deserved this.

The worry for her now is that more of her own party take her up on the offer, and that the Tories will be seriously stripped of talent — particularly those right wingers looking to the faction Kruger was a part of as hope for the future. There were fears of similar events last week, when Reform MP Richard Tice tweeted of an upcoming announcement with Suella Braverman and David Frost — although it turned out to be a naughty teaser for a new paper on how to leave the ECHR they had co-authored with the Prosperity Institute. His loss will also come as a blow to Robert Jenrick’s hopes to succeed her, however, as Kruger ran his last election campaign.

As for Reform, Kruger’s defection should mark a turning point. They can now afford to be more selective about who they take from the party, and should exercise that right with enthusiasm. Dorries, as I wrote at the time, was an awkward fit; not only because she would inevitably call for Boris to be included somehow (which she did, and was rightly and roughly corrected for) but because she was also the institutor of the Online Safety Act, which Reform are the only party to campaign against.

Part of Reform’s USP is as a right-wing rebellion against the 14 Tory years, but in particular the failure of Boris Johnson’s government. Soaking up the voters (a people betrayed!) is fine, but what benefit is there to bringing in someone who was so integral to the project you rose in revolt to? The answer is that up until now, Reform simply needed numbers. They needed someone to wheel out at their press conferences to build the narrative that the right wall of the Tories was tumbling into the turquoise sea, they needed more media performers and they needed bums on seats.

But importing too many veterans of the old regime dilutes Reform’s claim to radical renewal. As I wrote when chairman David Bull used his first media appearance to repeat the false liberal piety that immigration had always been Britain’s lifeblood:

What, exactly, is Reform? Is it a disciplined vehicle for delivering a hard reset on mass migration, a personality-led protest movement prone to contradiction, or a vehicle for political c-listers to ride a wave of public anger on immigration into the spotlight?

Reform should now switch to appraising defectors for their credibility, not visibility. They are beginning to build their own intellectual infrastructure, and Kruger has been made head of Reform’s new unit preparing the party for government. It is adding figures like this that should now be Reform’s priority. Kruger’s move will leave many clinging on in the Tory right debating their future in the party, and it is likely that defections are about to become a lot more common, and a lot higher quality. Like a collector who has suddenly unearthed a rich vein of rare finds, Nigel Farage can suddenly afford to be far more discerning trying to fill his Cabinet. As for Kemi, isn’t this what she wanted?