Badenoch’s “calamity Cabinet” cannot credibly hold government to account

5 Nov 2024

EMBARGO: IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Liberal Democrats have branded Kemi Badenoch’s new shadow ministers a “calamity Cabinet” that cannot credibly hold the government to account, citing their litany of failures during the previous Conservative government:

Leader of the Opposition Kemi Badenoch called Truss’s disastrous mini-budget “100% right”, labelling the then-PM “aspirational and inspirational”.
Shadow Chancellor Mel Stride voted five times to hike National Insurance in 2021.
Shadow Foreign Secretary Priti Patel designed the failed Rwanda asylum plan which cost the UK taxpayer hundreds of millions, and was forced to resign from her ministerial role in 2017 after holding a series of undisclosed meetings while on holiday in Israel.
Shadow Minister of State for Education Neil O’Brien was Minister for Primary Care and Public Health – by the end of his time as minister, the waiting list for hospital treatment had reached a record high of 7.7 million people.

Liberal Democrat Cabinet Office Spokesperson Sarah Olney MP said:

“Kemi Badenoch’s calamity Cabinet simply can’t hold this Labour government to account because their fingerprints are all over the biggest problems facing the country today.

“From leaving the NHS in crisis to wrecking the economy, there’s no corner of this country that the Conservatives left untainted.

“But the real skeleton in this Shadow Cabinet closet is Liz Truss’s mini-budget, which these Conservative MPs voted through despite it knocking pensions for six and sending mortgages spiralling.

“Only the Liberal Democrats can provide the decent opposition our country so desperately needs.”

ENDS

Notes to Editor:

Kemi Badenoch tweets here and here

NHS statistics from Sept 2023, toward end of Neil O’Brien’s tenure: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7281/#:~:text=Before%202020%2C%20the%20NHS%20in,over%20the%20past%20two%20years