Kemi Badenoch’s secret post-conference Tory memo

MEMO FROM THE OFFICE OF LEADER KEMI BADENOCH

BCC: ALL STAFF, POLICY UNIT, CCHQ

Everyone (and Minty!),

Thanks for your hard work delivering yet another headline grabbing gathering for the world’s most successful political party. The AI Bayeux tapestry thing went down a storm on the socials, especially John Healey’s elf ears; Laura K was as fair and balanced as ever; and no one got wind of the incident. As Kemi told the FT, “The party will be doing what I want to do, because it’s my Conservative Party now.” I think we can all agree this to be a very good thing.

There is, however, one tiny cloud. Kemi has achieved an almost unprecedented level of popularity – last count, her net favorability stood at a staggering minus three! – and yet the public has repeatedly failed to rise to the challenge she has set. Indeed, since she took over, the party’s poll share has actually gone down. I’m sure it will surprise no one to learn that Kemi is disappointed in all of you.

We have, however, the beginnings of a strategy. In office, you’ll recall, we repeatedly went out of our way to protect the economic interests of older voters at the expense of the young: imposing harsher terms on student loans, raising taxes on work while protecting housing wealth at all costs, promising to bring back national service. And yet the polls stubbornly continued to decline.

There is only one possible conclusion: we have not gone far enough. We have not been true Conservatives. We’re getting good reviews for our steadfast defence of the triple lock, even as we announce “tough love” plans to cut benefits to the under 25s. But to win back those we’ve lost to Reform, we need to show whose side we’re really on

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Bullets for discussion follow.

A new bedroom tax, paid by those renting a bedroom.
A formal government scheme allowing renters to tip their landlords directly through the tax system.
A multispeed queueing system for Glastonbury tickets, which prioritises guests on the basis of age (thanks to fallow years, a 55 year old may have as few as ten opportunities left to attend).
A new top of rate of VAT charged exclusively on k-pop and grime records, avocados, TikToks and macha.
Medals and ranks for boomers, in formal recognition of their service during the war.
A points-based system of national service, based on the following characteristics: age (obviously); housing tenure (homeowners more likely to serve their community already); marital status (can spin the unmarried as less likely to serve their community already, provided, obviously, they’ve never been married before); graduates paying back loans via Plan 2 (after borrowing such silly sums of money from the government, it is time to give something back).
Conscription for NEETs (this obviously overlaps with the system outlined above, but we’re pretty confident we can get a second set of headlines out of it). We’re also looking into whether they could be encouraged to earn full citizenship rights through donation of blood or, possibly, organs.
Increased tax rates on the childless, to balance the fact they get to go on holiday during term times.
A new, national curfew.
A national enquiry into whether compensation for the WASPI campaign should be extended to cover men born before 1960.
Brexit again, somehow.

Some of this may seem a little off, especially to those whose parents are ungenerous, or worse. But we must not be swayed by the siren call of words like “fairness”, “equality” or “justice”.