Cleverly says it was a mistake for Sunak to say he would ‘stop the boats’ because that was ‘unachievable target’ – UK politics live

Senior Conservatives have been reluctant to criticise Liz Truss directly over her mini-budget at this conference, even though it had a terrible impact on the party’s poll rating. But Robert Jenrick has gone further than most others in an interview with ITV’s Peston being broadcast tonight. Asked about the mini-budget, he said:

I think that the mini budget in particular did great harm to our reputation for sound management of the public finances - it was cack-handed, it was careless and it was unconservative and that is part of my mission now, to rebuild our reputation for sound management of the public finances and reclaim the mantle for low tax and pro growth.

Kemi Badenoch has denied suggestions that her maternity pay gaffe was damaging to her campaign.

When Emily Maitlis from the News Agents podcast asked her if the “maternity row” had damaged her, Badenoch hit back, saying:

I don’t know what maternity row you are talking about.

I’ve given a statement and said that maternity pay is important.

If people want to have a confected row, they’re well within their rights to do that.

But I am having a serious conversation in this party about the existential crisis that faces us.

James Cleverly has said that Rishi Sunak’s decision to say that he would “stop the boats” was a mistake.

Speaking at a fringe meeting, he said:

I think the phrase stop the boats was an error.

It distilled a very, very complicated and challenging problem into a soundbite.

The implication – not the implication, I suppose the self-imposed yardstick – was even one boat was a failure, and that was an unachievable target.

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During the Q&A in the conference hall this afternoon, Tom Tugendhat and Kemi Badenoch both talked about the need for a cap on immigration. But, while Tugendhat called for a very firm limit, Badenoch implied she wanted more flexibility.

Tugendhat said he believed in a firm net migration limit of 100,000 people coming in to the UK each year. In the past Tory ministers backed a cap in theory, but demanded exemptions. He said:

Secretaries of state need to own their record. I got deeply frustrated with this pledge that you and I constantly heard and I made because I meant it, of up to 100,000.

“(You) then hear secretaries of state saying ‘Yeah, no I get that, but my department is an exception. My department is different. My department’s not the same as others. Oh no, I get the cap, but not for me.’

Well I’m afraid that’s not how government works. You’ve got to actually mean it. And I’m afraid when secretaries of state say ‘trade will suffer, health will suffer, foreign relations will suffer, we won’t get the builders in to housing’, well that’s not the answer.

You’ve got to train people, you’ve got to inspire apprenticeships, you’ve got to put a cap on degrees, you have got to make sure that what you’re actually doing is helping people to fill those spaces.”

Badenoch said she thought a cap was necessary, but that it would have to be cleverly designed. She explained:

I think there will need to be a cap, but we also need to design a system that means the cap cannot be manipulated.

So you won’t hear me say, I promise to have a cap and it’s going to be this number. It’s very easy to create a cap, we saw this with the point migration system.

If you have a cap and you have lots of the wrong people coming in, or worse good people leaving our country – good people leaving our country is great for net migration stats – migration stats shouldn’t just be about the numbers, it should be about who is coming in, who is leaving, why that is happening, otherwise we are talking to the letter not the spirit of lowering immigration.

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Robert Jenrick has renewed his call for the Tory leadership contest to be shortened. At a fringe meeting this afternoon he said:

[I told CCHQ] 100%, whether it’s me or somebody else, the next leader of this party needs to be stood at the dispatch box making the argument to Rachel Reeves, holding her to account.

I do not know for the life of me why this decision has been made.

It’s very kind of Rishi [Sunak] to agree to do this, but I think it should be the next leader of our party who’s making that argument.

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Here is video of Kemi Badenoch telling the conference she lived a working class life when she come to London as a teenager from Nigeria. (See 3.23pm.)

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In her Q&A in the conference hall Kemi Badenoch said she described herself as working class when she arrived in London as a teenager because, although she had had a middle class life in Nigeria, in London she was poor. (See 3.23pm.) The description of this period of her life in Blue Ambition, Lord Ashcroft’s biography of her, broadly backs up this account, although it also claims she did not have to work at this point. It says:

“Most of the time I was out of the house because I was working,” remembers Dr [Abiola Tilley Gyado, a friend of Badenoch’s parents’, who had a house on the outskirts of Wimbledon where Badenoch was staying]. “I had some responsibility for health programmes in my organisation so I travelled a lot.” This left Badenoch with time on her hands, sometimes rattling around the house alone, so she took a part-time job preparing food at McDonald’s in Wimbledon town centre. Never having eaten a hamburger before, Badenoch couldn’t believe her luck in being able to enjoy them free of charge as a perk. “She worked there at weekends and in the holidays,” Dr Gyado says. “It wasn’t what she had to do. I didn’t ask her for money for rent or food. It was her choice to work hard.” With this small income, Badenoch sometimes went out to the theatre. Otherwise she would be at home studying, writing letters to her family, reading or watching television. The idea of frequenting London’s pubs and clubs did not occur to her and she had few friends with whom to socialise.

As PA Media reports, Simon Case was appointed cabinet secretary by Boris Johnson in September 2020. PA says:

Evidence at the UK Covid inquiry revealed he was often exasperated by the administration.

He said he found Johnson’s style of working “very frustrating” and described his day-to-day administration as “dysfunctional”.

In July 2020, before he became cabinet secretary, Case said: “I’ve never seen a bunch of people less well-equipped to run a country.”

He also described Mr Johnson and his inner circle as “basically feral” and suggested that Carrie, Johnson’s partner at the time, now his wife, was “the real person in charge” in No 10.

Case had previously worked as private secretary to the then Duke of Cambridge, the current Prince of Wales.

In a message to colleagues announcing his decision to stand down at the end of the year, Simon Case said he hoped civil servants would in future remain “servants of others”, leaving party politics to politicians. He said:

Those who choose public service deserve thanks for the choice they have made, whether that service be in politics, the civil service, the armed forces, the emergency services, our National Health Service, local government and beyond. I have seen truly motivated people doing remarkable things in the pursuit of their nations’ and communities’ interests through a pandemic, wars, a change of reign, economic emergencies and unprecedented demand for modern public services. I have seen so very many colleagues committed to their purpose, displaying tenacity and ingenuity, whilst sacrificing their own personal interests for others.

As the civil service continues its journey forwards, I hope those who make up our number now and in the future can continue the pursuit of that necessary balance of continuity and change. The world is changing fast and so must the civil service. The global context, the relentless evolution of technology, increasing public expectations of the services they consume and many more factors require us to keep adapting.

At the same time, the core values of our United Kingdom have not changed and so I hope that the civil service will hold onto its fundamental purpose and values in the never-ending task of serving the government of the day and, through them, the people of our country. We must remain servants of others. We should resist the temptation to become the arbiters of, or participants in, legitimate democratic debate, leaving party politics to politicians and demonstrating our enduring and profound belief in democracy through the service of the elected government of the day.

This is what Simon Case has said about his resignation.

This morning, I informed the prime minister of my intention to step down as cabinet secretary and head of the civil service at the end of the year.

As many of you know, I have been undergoing medical treatment for a neurological condition over the last 18 months and, whilst the spirit remains willing, the body is not. It is a shame that I feel I have to spell this out, but my decision is solely to do with my health and nothing to do with anything else.

He said the prime minister would appoint his successor following a “full, open and transparent process which will be run by the First Civil Service Commissioner,” adding:

It has been an honour to serve two sovereigns, four prime ministers and over 120 cabinet ministers in this role.

There have been far more ups than downs along the way and by far the greatest highlight has been the privilege of working with so many remarkable public servants, across the length and breadth of our country, in our overseas posts and with counterparts from our close allies and partners around the world.

Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, has announced he will stand down at the end of the year on health grounds, saying “whilst the spirit remains willing, the body is not”.

This announcement is has been expected for a while, and it will be welcomed by Labour figures who believe that he has not been an effective cabinet secretary, particularly because his relations with Sue Gray, Keir Starmer’s chief of staff, are strained.

The announcement means Starmer can now activate the process of choosing a successor.

Badenoch says, if she becomes PM, she will remove VAT on private school fees.

Badenoch says the saddest moment of her career came when she had to resign from Boris Johnson’s government. She says she loved him. She defended him over the wallpaer controversy. She thought he was being unfairly hounded over Partygate. But it got to the point where ministers were being send out to say things that were untrue. It was important to show the public the party had integrity, she says.

Q: Should we bring forward the date the contest ends?

Badenoch says the party have set the date and should stick with it. If they keep changing their mind, they will look “not serious”. She says she does not accept the argument that the new leader needs to reply to the budget.

We have a prime minister who’s never been in the Treasury. We have a leader of the opposition who used to be chancellor. We have a shadow chancellor who knows that building [the Treasury] inside out. We can do this. It’s not about who’s becoming leader a few days later. It is about us using all of the talents within our party.