A bit more of the article - you can sign up for two free ones a month. At least she’s not going to stand candidates down. Hilarious she thinks this is the most left wing government ever - wait until she hears about Attlee.
Badenoch says the Tories could win and claims there is a ‘high chance’ she will become prime minister. But asked explicitly whether she would be prepared to put Farage into No. 10 if he fell short of a majority, she made it clear the answer is likely yes, as long as he pursues conservative policies: ‘This country cannot have another left-wing government. This is the most left-wing parliament we have ever had.’
The one caveat is that she thinks some of what Reform wants to do fails that test. ‘Reform has quite a lot of left-wing ideas. They want more benefits. They want more nationalisation. They want the big state. They just want to be in charge of it.’ But Badenoch implied she would accept a confidence and supply deal to ‘deliver a conservative agenda’, That quite literally means a deal to back a government in a confidence motion or on a budget. It means the other party can withhold support on policies they don’t support.
However, Badenoch explicitly ruled out standing candidates down or an arrangement to target resources so the two parties could focus on different seats before an election. ‘We don’t need to do a pact… deals, non-aggression pacts. These things end up falling apart anyway. I’m just saying. No. It’s just no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.’ As Theresa May once said, remind you of anyone?
But the proof that she is prepared to do deals with likeminded politicians comes with her admission that she already has a casual arrangement with Rupert Lowe, the leader of Restore Britain, who took a Tory seat on the public accounts committee. ‘Rupert Lowe wants to cut spending in a way that Nigel Farage doesn’t,’ she explains.
Asked if she would accept Lowe as a Tory one day, she says: ‘I don’t think I would go that far.’ But she adds: ‘I respect the fact that he turns up for work, which Nigel Farage doesn’t do. He does policy. He doesn’t run away.’ Similarly, Rosie Duffield, the former Labour MP, who shares Badenoch’s views on trans rights, was also gifted a Tory slot on a select committee.