Michelle Donelan is a former Secretary of State for Science, Innovation, and Technology, and was Conservative MP for Chippenham from 2015 to 2024.
Too many people at the last election didn’t see a real difference between the Conservative party and Labour in terms of policy and values.
In many ways that is what Sir Keir Starmer wanted: he could just sit on the fence and watch while the Tory field next door burnt. Voters began to ask how could Labour possibly be any worse, whilst being confused about what the Conservative Party stood for.
We had made mistakes and had a merry go round of leaders but fundamentally we had lost our identity. You can’t ignite passion or encourage people to place their faith in you if they don’t understand what you stand for.
For too long, the two main parties have talked a big game, offering different rhetoric, but when it comes down to it, the substance has been indistinguishable: higher immigration, higher taxes, more government intervention. In politics, such tricks don’t work forever.
Voters are savvy; they judge politicians by actions, not just words. When they aren’t presented with a real choice, they feel disenfranchised. The last election showed this clearly: millions of voters, feeling powerless, either turned to Reform or stayed home entirely.
If we want to bring those voters back, we need to start by electing a leader who truly offers choice. It needs to be someone offering something different to Starmer, someone who can reignite a sense of enthusiasm for change. For me, that leader is Kemi Badenoch.
Her approach to leadership is grounded in unshakeable principles. In her launch speech, Kemi laid out her core values: personal responsibility, citizenship, equality under the law, family values, and objective truth. These aren’t just buzzwords; they stand in stark contrast to Starmer’s Labour.
At the next election, voters must be offered a genuine alternative. On the doorsteps, I heard it time and again: people no longer knew what the Conservative Party stood for, and many felt there was barely any difference between us and Labour.
Kemi understands this frustration. Having spent her formative years in socialist Nigeria before returning to the UK, she knows firsthand what happens when politics lacks conservative principles.
But this issue of providing a real choice at the polls goes beyond the Conservative Party. Unlike in a dictatorship, where uniformity is enforced, our system thrives on differences of opinion. Disagreement is the lifeblood of democracy: voters should feel empowered when they go to the polls, knowing they are choosing between two genuinely different visions for the country.
Without that choice, we end up with results like the 2024 Election, where millions either cast their votes for minor parties or didn’t vote at all, leaving us with a government that three-quarters of Britons didn’t ask for.
Choosing our next leader is therefore about more than just renewing our Party – it’s about renewing our democracy. We can’t win voters back with slick marketing and shiny packaging; it has to be about substance and principles.
That’s why there’s such a buzz around Kemi right now. For the sake of our party and our country, we must inject real choice back into our elections, and she is the leader to do it.
Michelle Donelan is a former Secretary of State for Science, Innovation, and Technology, and was Conservative MP for Chippenham from 2015 to 2024.
Too many people at the last election didn’t see a real difference between the Conservative party and Labour in terms of policy and values.
In many ways that is what Sir Keir Starmer wanted: he could just sit on the fence and watch while the Tory field next door burnt. Voters began to ask how could Labour possibly be any worse, whilst being confused about what the Conservative Party stood for.
We had made mistakes and had a merry go round of leaders but fundamentally we had lost our identity. You can’t ignite passion or encourage people to place their faith in you if they don’t understand what you stand for.
For too long, the two main parties have talked a big game, offering different rhetoric, but when it comes down to it, the substance has been indistinguishable: higher immigration, higher taxes, more government intervention. In politics, such tricks don’t work forever.
Voters are savvy; they judge politicians by actions, not just words. When they aren’t presented with a real choice, they feel disenfranchised. The last election showed this clearly: millions of voters, feeling powerless, either turned to Reform or stayed home entirely.
If we want to bring those voters back, we need to start by electing a leader who truly offers choice. It needs to be someone offering something different to Starmer, someone who can reignite a sense of enthusiasm for change. For me, that leader is Kemi Badenoch.
Her approach to leadership is grounded in unshakeable principles. In her launch speech, Kemi laid out her core values: personal responsibility, citizenship, equality under the law, family values, and objective truth. These aren’t just buzzwords; they stand in stark contrast to Starmer’s Labour.
At the next election, voters must be offered a genuine alternative. On the doorsteps, I heard it time and again: people no longer knew what the Conservative Party stood for, and many felt there was barely any difference between us and Labour.
Kemi understands this frustration. Having spent her formative years in socialist Nigeria before returning to the UK, she knows firsthand what happens when politics lacks conservative principles.
But this issue of providing a real choice at the polls goes beyond the Conservative Party. Unlike in a dictatorship, where uniformity is enforced, our system thrives on differences of opinion. Disagreement is the lifeblood of democracy: voters should feel empowered when they go to the polls, knowing they are choosing between two genuinely different visions for the country.
Without that choice, we end up with results like the 2024 Election, where millions either cast their votes for minor parties or didn’t vote at all, leaving us with a government that three-quarters of Britons didn’t ask for.
Choosing our next leader is therefore about more than just renewing our Party – it’s about renewing our democracy. We can’t win voters back with slick marketing and shiny packaging; it has to be about substance and principles.
That’s why there’s such a buzz around Kemi right now. For the sake of our party and our country, we must inject real choice back into our elections, and she is the leader to do it.