Robert Jenrick MP, the former Communities Secretary, has this afternoon kicked off his bid for the Conservative leadership with a rally in his Newark constituency. The rally is the first public event of the upcoming Conservative Party leadership contest.
Addressing his supporters, Mr Jenrick played heavily on the fact that he had resigned as immigration minister stating, “I for one was not willing to be another minister who makes and breaks policies on immigration”.
Continuing Jenrick said, “We broke our promise to the British public to deliver controlled and reduced migration, and to establish the secure border that the public rightly demands. We allowed the cycle of broken promises to continue”.
He added, “If mass migration was rocket fuel for our economy, we would have just lived through the greatest age of economic growth, but we haven’t”.
Speaking without notes behind a slogan, ‘Change, Win, Deliver’, Jenrick was at times critical of the previous Conservative government, stating, “Growth was too low, and taxes were too high, and we lost our hard won reputation for sound financial management”.
Formerly nick-named ‘Robert Generic’ for his centrist positioning, the MP for Newark now appears to be targeting support from the right of the Conservative Party.
Referencing how ‘I believe in a small state that works, not a big state that fails’, Jenrick also called for defence spending to be increased to 3% of GDP and for future house building to be focussed on cities.
Since his resignation in late 2023, Mr Jenrick is known to have been working hard to cultivate supporters amongst Conservative MPs with an eye on the current contest.
To date this work appears to be paying dividends.
Amongst those so far publicly endorsing Mr Jenrick are the Conservative MPs, Mark Pritchard, Danny Kruger, Esther McVey, Caroline Johnson, Sir Edward Leigh, and Sir John Hayes.
Surprising his rivals with a well oiled campaign that appears to be gaining momentum, Mr Jenrick has now become the second favourite with bookmakers to win this autumn’s contest.
Aged 42, Mr Jenrick is the youngest of the six Conservative leadership contenders. He worked as a solicitor and as a director of the auction house, Christies, before being first elected to Westminster in 2014.
Alongside Mr Jenrick, the former Cabinet Ministers, Mel Stride, Priti Patel, James Cleverly, Kemi Badenoch, and Tom Tugendhat are all currently standing for the Conservative leadership.
This list of six will be reduced to four by a ballot of the 121 Conservative MPs on 4th September, and then down to a shortlist of 2 in a further ballot of Conservative MPs after the Conservative Party conference on 10th October.
During late October, Conservative Party members will then vote in a online ballot to select the eventual winner, with the result announced on 2nd November.
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