Oral Answers to Questions

Kemi Badenoch Excerpts

Wednesday 12th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Leader of the Opposition.

[Mrs Kemi Badenoch (North West Essex) (Con)]

I associate my party with the Prime Minister’s comments about Remembrance Week and about Manfred Goldberg and Mervyn Kersh, who is in the Gallery today.

This morning on the BBC, the Health Secretary said that there is a “toxic culture” in Downing Street that needs to change. He is right, isn’t he?

[The Prime Minister]

My focus each and every day is on rebuilding and renewing our country. Let me be absolutely clear: any attack on any member of my Cabinet is completely unacceptable. In relation to the Health Secretary, he promised before the election that in the first year of a Labour Government we would deliver 2 million extra appointments. We did not deliver 2 million or 3 million or 4 million. We delivered 5 million extra appointments. Today the Health Secretary is in Manchester, where he is announcing that because of the action he has taken to abolish NHS England, he is putting more people on the frontline. He is doing a great job, as is the whole of my Cabinet.

[Mrs Badenoch]

What we heard the Health Secretary say this morning was that he wants to cut waiting lists, but we all know that there is only one waiting list he really wants to cut.

The Prime Minister is not going to do anything about the toxic culture, but this is his responsibility. Just last night, his allies accused not just the Health Secretary but the Home Secretary and even the Energy Secretary of launching leadership bids. These attacks came from No. 10—nowhere else: his toxic No. 10. The person responsible for the culture in No. 10 is his chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney. Does the Prime Minister have full confidence in him?

[The Prime Minister]

Morgan McSweeney, my team and I are absolutely focused on delivering for the country. Let me be clear: of course I have never authorised attacks on Cabinet members. I appointed them to their posts because they are the best people to carry out their jobs.

The right hon. Lady asks about waiting lists—waiting lists are down under this Government. The number of GPs is up, and because we have scrapped NHS England we are investing on the frontline. That is what the Health Secretary is doing today: getting on with his job, and he is doing a very good job too.

[Mrs Badenoch]

I did not hear the Prime Minister give his full confidence in Morgan McSweeney. He says that these attacks are not authorised. The truth is that that means he has lost control of No. 10, because that is where they are coming from. But the real scandal is that, two weeks from a Budget, the Government have descended into civil war. Instead of fixing the mess they have made of the economy, they are all—[Interruption.] Mr Speaker, they are all chuntering. These are the “feral MPs” that No.10 has been talking about. Those are not my words; they are No. 10’s words—his words.

Unbelievably, the Prime Minister’s advisers have been reduced to briefing that MPs cannot get rid of him—I am not making this up—because it would destabilise international markets. Why does the Prime Minister think that there would be a market meltdown if the Health Secretary took over?

[The Prime Minister]

This is a united team and we are delivering together. Look at what we are delivering: the fastest growth in the G7; five interest rate cuts; trade deals with the EU, the US and India—all of which the Conservatives opposed. We have delivered. I can update the House—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Badenoch]

The Prime Minister is talking about growth and investment. While he desperately tries to cling on to his own job, perhaps he understands what it is like for all those people out there losing their jobs. How can he talk about growth? Yesterday, we learned that unemployment has risen to the same rate as it was in lockdown—180,000 jobs lost. Why does the Prime Minister think that unemployment has risen every single month since Labour took office?

[The Prime Minister]

Let me give the House the details: 329,000 more people are in work since the start of this year. Of course I accept that we need to do more in relation to unemployment. That is why we are transforming jobcentres, which the Conservatives opposed. That is why we are working with 60 major businesses to tackle ill health in the workplace and have invested £3.8 billion in tailored back-to-work support, which the Conservatives opposed. I also remind the Leader of the Opposition that average unemployment in the 14 years of her Government was 5.4%—higher than the rate today.

[Mrs Badenoch]

We left employment higher than it was after the last Labour Government. Let me tell the Prime Minister what is causing the increase in unemployment: his disastrous Budget last year. To be clear for all those Labour MPs shaking their heads, it is last year’s tax rises that have killed jobs, and that is what is going to trigger this year’s tax rises. This is the tax doom loop. There is only one way out of it, and that is to cut spending. Why is the Prime Minister instead offering welfare giveaways to save his own skin?

[The Prime Minister]

I will tell the Leader of the Opposition why we increased national insurance: it was because of the mess the Conservatives left the country in. The NHS was on its knees; now we have 5 million extra appointments, waiting lists are down and there are 2,500 more GPs as a result of our decisions. It is nearly the one-year anniversary, but on national insurance she still has not told us whether she agrees and admits that we should do it. If her position is that we should not, how would she find the money that we raised in the Budget? She has had a whole year to think about that question. Perhaps now she can give us an answer.

[Mrs Badenoch]

I would not have made the stupid mistake in the first place of putting up the jobs tax and killing jobs. Since Labour came in, it has been disaster after disaster. The Deputy Prime Minister—the new Deputy Prime Minister—is clueless about how many illegal migrant sex offenders he has let loose; the Culture Secretary is breaking the rules to give her donor a top job; taxes are set to rise even further; unemployment is at levels not seen since lockdown; and in the middle of it is a weak Prime Minister at war with his own Cabinet. It is not just him; it is all of them. There is no replacement; it is all of them. Two weeks before the Budget, is it not the case that this Prime Minister has lost control of his Government, lost the confidence of his party and lost the trust of the British people?

[The Prime Minister]

The stupid mistakes were made over 14 long years. The Conservatives broke the economy and now they think they can lecture us. Now they have this unserious idea that they can find £47 billion of cuts without saying where they will come from. No wonder that is called flimsy. Meanwhile, we are rebuilding the country: wages up, investment up, mortgages down. [Interruption.]