Tory leadership hopeful Kemi Badenoch has set out her plan to defeat Nigel Farage and his insurgent Reform UK.
The populist party was a significant thorn in the side of the Conservatives at the July General Election, winning the third highest share of the popular vote.
It cost the Tories a significant amount of constituencies, forcing them to sit up and take notice of the right-wing faction.
Badenoch told Tory members that the party must understand why it lost such a significant amount of votes to Reform.
Kemi Badenoch discussed the threat of Farage
GB NEWS / PA
“My belief is we lost votes to Reform because we did not deliver on our promises, especially on immigration and tax”, she said.
“We promised lower immigration, we promised lower tax, we didn’t deliver that. In order to do that, we must focus on the first half.
“We shouldn’t make promises we can’t deliver and earn back trust. We also need to look at what the Reform leader has done to be successful.
“We also need to look at what the Reform Party leader has done to be successful.
“Nigel Farage speaks with clarity and conviction. When people hear him speak, they believe he understands his concerns. For a long time when we were speaking, people just heard this technocratic managerialist language which didn’t mean much to people.
“It was all policy, no principles. That is why I keep emphasising principles. Some say ‘you need to tack to the left, you need to tack to the right’.
“It is not about left or right, it is about right or wrong.”