Jenrick: Badenoch’s reluctance to kick out Truss shows Tories have not changed

Writing in The Times, Mr Jenrick repeated his belief that Britain is broken “not beyond repair, but broken today as never before in my lifetime”.

He said Mrs Badenoch told a shadow cabinet meeting that party members did not believe the country was broken.

“This is the central philosophical divide in politics today: managed decline or change,” he said.

He added that the unwillingness to remove Ms Truss from the party showed a reluctance to change.

“In 42 days, she single-handedly demolished the party’s reputation for fiscal credibility, undermined the country’s credit ratings and forced many to re-evaluate their retirement,” he wrote.

“If the party doesn’t have the balls to kick out Truss, will it really have the gumption to take on the vested interests that stand in the way of all the change our country needs?

“Sadly and very painfully, I concluded that it didn’t.”

He told Times Radio that Mrs Badenoch was not prepared to acknowledge how broken Britain is.

Mr Jenrick said: “I don’t believe you can even begin to fix it unless you’re willing to own up, see what’s actually happening, recognise the scale of the challenge.

“It feels like Kemi and the Conservative Party have got their heads in the sand right now.”

Shadow cabinet minister James Cartlidge said Mrs Badenoch had shown “amazing leadership” of the Conservative Party in the face of “very difficult” opinion poll ratings.

The shadow defence secretary told Times Radio: “I don’t like this whole ‘broken Britain’ narrative. I’m proud to be British, proud of my country and proud of my party.

“If others want to desert the ship, that’s up to them. You know, I think Kemi has shown some amazing leadership recently.

“She’s made the right decisions, the big calls, and whilst we remain in, obviously, very difficult territory in terms of our polling, I think there are some positive signs, and I’m committed to backing her and a party which I think ultimately will emerge from this stronger and more united.”

Writing for The Daily Telegraph on Saturday, Mrs Badenoch attempted to offer a more positive vision of the nation, in an attempt to create a dividing line with Reform.

She said: “Ours is still one of the most successful, resilient and influential countries on Earth. A country that has reinvented itself repeatedly. A country whose people quietly get on with things while politicians argue.

“Telling them their country is finished does not empower the British people – it drags them down.”

She later added: “Yes, Britain’s problems are real, and in some cases getting worse. But Britain is not broken. We are a great country with deep reserves of strength, talent and resilience.”

On Sunday, Andrew Rosindell became the second Conservative MP to defect to Reform in a week.