I joined the Conservatives for the partying, says Kemi Badenoch

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has said that she initially joined the Conservatives for “the party aspect – socialising, drinking, hanging out with other young people”.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, Badenoch said that after university all her friends “moved all over the world” and she thought it would be “a fun thing” to join the party.

She met her husband through membership of the Conservatives and dedicated one of her records – Wet Wet Wet’s Love Is All Around – to him.

The interview was recorded on 19 January, a week after three high-profile Conservatives, including former minister Robert Jenrick, joined Reform UK.

Asked how she would steady the Tory ship, Badenoch said: “I think defection is part of steadying the ship.

“And while it’s always sad to lose people who used to be in the team, losing people who weren’t team players and were more focused about their personal ambition rather than the country’s ambition is really helpful in showing what kind of party we are.”

Badenoch took over the leadership of his party in 2024 after suffering its worst-ever general election defeat.

His party has since fallen behind in opinion polls, been overtaken by Reform UK and faces a major defeat in the 2025 local elections.

Badenoch said the Conservative Party has been in existence for more than 200 years and his “mission” after being elected leader in 2024 was to make sure we don’t just disappear.

He said he had a “long-term strategy” to win back voters but there would be “setbacks along the way.”

“Often, what you’re doing long term isn’t as helpful in the short term.”

His musical choices for the program included The Story of Tonight from the musical Hamilton and Baz Luhrmann’s Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen).

He said the Australian film director’s 1997 colloquial song contained advice that was still “relevant” and was “very sympathetic to politicians”.

“It says ‘Accept a few inalienable truths – prices will rise, politicians will cheat and you too will grow old.’

“I’ve always thought it’s very helpful to think about life moving forward faster. I’ll get older too. What do I want?”

Explaining why she chose The Story of Tonight – a number in which the revolutionaries from the American War of Independence sing about the future and friendship – Badenoch said it reminded her of the first time she ran to become leader of the Conservative Party in 2022.

“There was a group of my friends, a rebellious group of junior ministers, who resigned because we were so frustrated that politics was not working.

“He said you have to stand up, only you will do well and we will support you.

“And I said, that’s a crazy idea. It won’t work and he said, don’t worry, we’re all in this together and if we look stupid, we’ll all look stupid together.”

Badenoch was part of the mass resignation of ministers that ousted Boris Johnson from office in July 2022.

Badenoch began his parliamentary career when he won the Essex seat of Saffron Walden for the Conservatives in 2010.

Asked how she managed to convince local conservatives to choose her as their candidate, despite having no ties to the area, she said: “They tell me I was funny, I was very honest, I wasn’t trying to be something I wasn’t.”

“I started by saying I could pretend that my family has been here since, you know, the Battle of Hastings, but I don’t think anyone here would believe me – and they laughed.

“He said later that this is the person who is exactly the same. And Essex is the same too.

“Essex is totally my personality – I call myself an Essex girl.”

She said her father, who died in 2022 just months before she was to run for the Conservative leadership for the first time, was proud that she had entered politics, saying: “I know you’ll go far.”

In contrast, he said that his mother was “tearing her hair out” when Badenoch began her political career.

“She said, why would you do that… you have a good job… why would you want to go into this horrible career.

“They had a very poor view of politicians and they thought they were doing everything for themselves… So I think part of what I’m trying to do now in politics is prove to them that politicians can be good people.”

Badenoch was born in London, but spent most of his childhood in Nigeria as well as the United States, where his mother lectured.

However, she says that her upbringing was steeped in British culture: “My childhood was like the last embers of the empire and the colonial era.”

“Everything on the telly was BBC,” she said, adding that she grew up watching the sitcoms Some Mothers Do Away With ‘Em and Doctor Who, which sparked a love of science fiction. For his luxury, he chose 22 “Marvel Universe” superhero movies.

As a child, she also read Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers books, which are based on the lives of girls at a Cornish boarding school in the 1940s and 50s.

The books, she said, gave her an unrealistic expectation of what her own boarding school would be like.

“It was like Lord of the Flies or Borstal,” she said, adding that every girl there had a machete to cut the grass.

You can listen to the full episode of Desert Island Discs on Radio 4 at 10:00 GMT and then On BBC Sounds.