Speech of the Month, April 2025 - Kemi Badenoch

Prime Minister’s Questions started out well for Keir Starmer on 23 April. He remarked on Pope Francis’s passing, he wished everyone a Happy St George’s Day, he was invited to look at a zoo from a Lim Dem minister, he then wished said minister’s guide dog a happy birthday, which received plenty of applause, and then Kemi Badenoch stood opposite him at the dispatch box and the tone changed markedly. 

“Mr Speaker,” she said, “does the PM now accept that when he said it was the law that trans-women were women, he was wrong?” 

Starmer must have know it was coming. Watching him over the last few years walk the ‘define what a women is’ tightrope has been excruciating. He can’t afford to upset the feminists who believe in biological sex or the LGBTQ progressives who don’t because both sets are generally Labour voters. Tricky. So, he’s gone from saying, “It’s not right to say all women have cervixes” to, “I agree with Tony Blair on this: a woman has a vagina” making himself look pretty ridiculous along the way. It’s no wonder that when the Supreme Court ruled on 15 April that a woman is defined by biological sex, Sir Keir said he “welcomes the clarity.”   

So, it was a zinger of an opening question for Badenoch. If you haven’t seen the exchange, do take a look…

She delivered a great follow-up question

Unsurprisingly, Starmer ducked her opening ‘Does the PM now accept that when he said it was the law that trans-women were women, he was wrong?’ question and relayed his ‘I welcome the clarity…’ key message. Badenoch replies, “Mr Speaker, he can’t bring himself to admit he was wrong. That was the question.” And then she did something bold and quite surprising; she demanded that he apologised to Rosie Duffield – a former Labour MP, now an Independent, who left the party because she felt Starmer didn’t support single-sex spaces. We saw shots of Rosie Duffield, glowering on from the backbenches but, guess what, no apology came either. Just more stuff about welcoming clarity.    

She was calm and measured

The Supreme Court ruling was a political gift for Badenoch who, let’s face it, hasn’t been awarded many, and she was clearly determined to enjoy this exchange. She didn’t rush. Her voice was measured. She let every word land nicely. 

She got off the page

Up until now, Badenoch’s performances at PMQs haven’t been great. As a new leader – leading a party that traditionally judges its leader harshly – it’s understandable that she stuck to the script and read from it too much. It was a safety net. But in this session, she came off the page lots, looking the Speaker and the PM in the eye. 

She didn’t react to the put-downs

Because Starmer couldn’t disclaim the accusations she was making, he had to attack her record and her performance at PMQs – “I can only assume that sounded better when she did it in the mirror earlier on” – and she looked unruffled by these slights. Not offended, certainly not hurt, not irritated, not incredulous. Nothing. And she looked all the more powerful for it. 

She didn’t wear a pussycat bow 

A female Tory leader who doesn’t look like she’s popped out of a Maggie Thatcher dressing-up box – that’s something! In fact, I thought her angled-neck outfit looked cracking. 

 

Course, none of this will save her from the Nasty Party. But at least she’s got a great vid to show the grandkids about that day in 2025 when she exposed a PM who didn't have the courage to say what he really thought about a very particular issue.