Junior ministerial offices

Minister of State for Local Government, Faith and Communities
In office 16 September 2021 – 6 July 2022
Prime Minister	Boris Johnson
Preceded by	Luke Hall
Succeeded by	Paul Scully
Minister of State for Equalities
In office 14 February 2020 – 6 July 2022
Prime Minister	Boris Johnson
Preceded by	The Baroness Williams of Trafford
Succeeded by	Amanda Solloway
Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury
In office 13 February 2020 – 16 September 2021
Prime Minister	Boris Johnson
Preceded by	Simon Clarke
Succeeded by	Helen Whately
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children and Families
In office 27 July 2019 – 13 February 2020
Prime Minister	Boris Johnson
Preceded by	Nadhim Zahawi
Succeeded by	Vicky Ford

Member of Parliament
for North West Essex
Saffron Walden (2017–2024)

Incumbent

Assumed office
8 June 2017

Preceded by

Alan Haselhurst

Majority

2,610 (4.8%)

Member of the London Assembly
as the 4th Additional Member

In office
5 May 2016 – 8 June 2017

Preceded by

Gareth Bacon

Succeeded by

Susan Hall

Member of the London Assembly
as the 9th Additional Member

In office
16 September 2015 – 5 May 2016

Preceded by

Victoria Borwick

Succeeded by

Shaun Bailey

Personal details

Born

Olukemi Olufunto Adegoke

2 January 1980 (age 44)
Wimbledon, London, England

Political party

Conservative

Spouse

Hamish Badenoch

(m. 2012)

Children

Education

University of Sussex (MEng)
Birkbeck, University of London (LLB)

Occupation

Politician
software engineer
consultant

Signature

Olukemi Olufunto Adegoke Badenoch ( KEM-ee-_-bay-DƏ-nok; née Adegoke, born 2 January 1980) is a British politician who has served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Conservative Party since 2 November 2024. She previously served in the Cabinet under prime ministers Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak from 2022 to 2024. She has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for North West Essex, previously Saffron Walden, since 2017.

In 2012, Badenoch unsuccessfully contested a seat in the London Assembly, but was appointed an Assembly Member after Victoria Borwick resigned upon becoming an MP in 2015. A supporter of Brexit in the 2016 referendum, Badenoch was elected to the House of Commons in 2017. After Boris Johnson became prime minister in July 2019, Badenoch was appointed Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children and Families. In the February 2020 reshuffle, she was appointed Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Equalities. In September 2021, she was promoted to Minister of State for Equalities and appointed Minister of State for Local Government, Faith and Communities.

In July 2022, Badenoch resigned from government in protest at Johnson's leadership; she stood unsuccessfully to replace him in the July–September 2022 Conservative Party leadership election. Following Liz Truss becoming prime minister in September 2022, Badenoch was appointed as Secretary of State for International Trade and President of the Board of Trade and was sworn in to the Privy Council; she was reappointed Trade Secretary by Truss' successor, Rishi Sunak, the following month, also becoming Minister for Women and Equalities.

In a February 2023 Cabinet reshuffle, Badenoch assumed the position of Secretary of State for Business and Trade following the merging of the Department for International Trade with elements of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. Badenoch retained the responsibilities of Women and Equalities Minister. After the Conservatives' defeat in the 2024 general election, Badenoch was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government in Sunak's Shadow Cabinet and later launched her bid to become leader of the Conservative Party in the 2024 Conservative Party leadership election. She defeated Robert Jenrick in the members vote, becoming Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Conservative Party.

Early life and education
Early career
Political career
- London Assembly
Parliamentary career
Personal life
See also

Early life and education

Olukemi Adegoke was born on 2 January 1980 in Wimbledon, London. She is one of three children born to Nigerian Yoruba parents. Her father, Femi Adegoke, was a GP and her mother, Feyi Adegoke, was a professor of physiology. She has a brother and a sister. Badenoch spent her childhood living in Lagos, Nigeria, and in the United States, where her mother lectured. She returned to the UK at the age of 16 to live with a friend of her mother's owing to the deteriorating political and economic situation in Nigeria, which had affected her family. Although a British citizen and born in the UK, during her parliamentary maiden speech Badenoch stated that she was "to all intents and purposes a first-generation immigrant".

Badenoch achieved A Levels from Phoenix College, a further education college in Morden, south London, whilst working at a branch of McDonald's among other jobs. During this time, she said she "became working class". Badenoch studied Computer Systems Engineering at the University of Sussex, completing a Master of Engineering (MEng) degree in 2003.

Early career

She initially worked within the IT sector, first as a software engineer at Logica (later CGI Group) from 2003 to 2006. While working there she read Law part-time at Birkbeck, University of London, graduating as Bachelor of Laws (LLB) in 2009. Badenoch then worked as a systems analyst at the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, before pursuing a career in consultancy and financial services, working as an associate director at private bank and wealth manager Coutts from 2006 to 2013 and later a digital director for The Spectator from 2015 to 2016.

Political career

Badenoch in 2017 speaking at the London Assembly's Energy Committee

Badenoch joined the Conservative Party in 2005 at the age of 25. At the 2010 general election, she contested the Dulwich and West Norwood constituency and came third, behind the Labour Party incumbent MP Tessa Jowell and the Liberal Democrat candidate Jonathan Mitchell.

London Assembly

In 2012, Badenoch stood for the Conservatives in the London Assembly election, where she was placed fifth on the London-wide list. The election saw the Conservatives win three seats from the London-wide list, meaning she was not elected.

Three years later, in the 2015 general election, Victoria Borwick was elected to the House of Commons and thus resigned her seat on the London Assembly. The fourth-placed candidate on the list, Suella Fernandes (Braverman), was also elected as an MP, so Badenoch became the new Assembly Member. She went on to retain her seat in the Assembly at the 2016 election, being succeeded in 2017 by fellow Conservative Susan Hall.

Badenoch supported Brexit in the 2016 UK EU membership referendum.

Parliamentary career

Badenoch was shortlisted to be the Conservative Party candidate for the marginal Hampstead and Kilburn constituency at the 2017 general election, but was unsuccessful. She was subsequently selected for the same election as the Conservative candidate for Saffron Walden, a safe seat for her party, which she won with 37,629 votes and a majority of 24,966 (41.0%).

Early tenure

In her maiden speech as an MP on 19 July 2017, she described the vote for Brexit as "the greatest ever vote of confidence in the project of the United Kingdom" and cited her personal heroes as the Conservative politicians Winston Churchill, Airey Neave and Margaret Thatcher.

In the same month, Badenoch was selected to join the 1922 Executive Committee. In September, she was appointed to the parliamentary Justice Select Committee. She was appointed as the Conservative Party's Vice Chair for Candidates in January 2018.

She voted for Theresa May's Brexit withdrawal agreement in early 2019. In the indicative votes on 27 March, she voted against a referendum on a withdrawal agreement and against a customs union with the EU. In October, Badenoch voted for Johnson's withdrawal agreement.

In the run-up to the 2019 Conservative Party leadership election, Badenoch was tipped as a possible contender just two years into her tenure in parliament. Badenoch instead supported the campaign of Michael Gove. In the December 2019 general election, she was re-elected with an increased majority of 27,594 (43.7%) votes.

Johnson government

In July 2019, Badenoch was appointed as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Children and Families by Boris Johnson. In February 2020, Badenoch was appointed Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Minister for Equalities) in the Department for International Trade.

In a Cabinet reshuffle in September 2021, Badenoch was promoted to Minister of State for Equalities and appointed Minister of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government. Within days of her appointments, the latter title was renamed "Minister of State for Levelling Up Communities". On 6 July 2022, Badenoch resigned from the government, citing Johnson's handling of the Chris Pincher scandal, in a joint statement with fellow ministers Alex Burghart, Neil O'Brien, Lee Rowley and Julia Lopez.

2022 Leadership candidacy

Badenoch's leadership bid logo

Following Johnson's resignation, Badenoch launched a bid to succeed him as Conservative Party leader, stating that she wanted to "tell the truth" and that she advocated "strong but limited government". As a candidate, she called the target of net zero carbon emissions "ill-thought through" and said that politicians had become "hooked on the idea of the state fixing the majority of problems".

According to The Sunday Times, Badenoch entered the race as "a relatively unknown minister for local government" but "within a week emerged as the insurgent candidate to become Britain’s next prime minister". She was eliminated in the fourth round of voting and did not endorse another candidate.

Truss government

In September 2022, after Liz Truss became prime minister, she appointed Badenoch to her Cabinet as Secretary of State for International Trade. Following Truss' resignation the following month, Badenoch endorsed Rishi Sunak in the leadership election, stating that he was "the serious, honest leader we need".

Sunak government

On 25 October 2022, Badenoch was retained as Secretary of State for International Trade by Rishi Sunak upon him becoming prime minister. She was also granted the additional role of Minister for Women & Equalities.

In a February 2023 Cabinet reshuffle, Badenoch was appointed as the first Secretary of State at the newly created Department for Business and Trade, with continued responsibility for equalities. The new role was effectively an expansion of her portfolio as International Trade Secretary to include the business and investment responsibilities of the newly dissolved Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

In 2022, Badenoch, as Equalities Minister, approved the appointment of Joanne Cash as a Commissioner to the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) board. Badenoch said that Cash had "a track record of promoting women's rights and freedom of expression". Subsequently, in the summer of 2022, Cash donated to Badenoch's campaign as a candidate for leadership of the Conservative Party. In 2023, after the appointment was completed, Anneliese Dodds, shadow equalities minister, said the government was engulfed in "sleaze and cronyism" and Badenoch should "come clean" about why she hadn't declared a political interest in the appointment. When it reported the story, The Guardian said Badenoch had not broken any rules and quoted an Equality Hub spokesperson saying the "appointment was made following a full and open competition".

In late April 2023, Badenoch announced that the government was planning to reduce the number of laws to be repealed to around 800, as opposed to the government's original target of around 4,000 laws. The change was met with dismay by Brexit advocates, including the Bill's original architect Jacob Rees-Mogg. Nevertheless, The New Statesman named her as the seventh most powerful British right-wing figure in 2023, describing her as the "darling" of many party members, in spite of "cooling enthusiasm".

On 1 May 2024 Badenoch's office used a letter sent by Conservative MP Eddie Hughes to Walsall Academy as evidence to support Badenoch's claim that girls at a school who did not want to use gender-neutral toilets developed urinary tract infections. Hughes had claimed in May 2023 in a letter to Walsall Academy that "one female pupil has developed a UTI" as she did not feel comfortable using gender-neutral toilets.

Opposition

Logo for Badenoch's 2024 leadership campaign

Due to the 2023 Periodic Review of Westminster constituencies, Badenoch's constituency of Saffron Walden was abolished, and replaced with North West Essex. At the 2024 general election, Badenoch was elected to Parliament as MP for North West Essex with 35.6% of the vote and a majority of 2,610. After the Conservative defeat at the general election, she was appointed Shadow Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government. She publicly criticised Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman. On 28 July 2024, she announced she was running in the election to be the new Tory leader. Despite being considered the frontrunner at the beginning of the contest Badenoch came second in both the first and second MP ballots to Robert Jenrick, winning 22 and 28 votes respectively. However, according to both YouGov's poll and ConservativeHome's survey of the Conservative Party membership, Badenoch still leads every other candidate in a head to head race in a membership vote. Badenoch topped the final vote of MPs with 42, one ahead of Robert Jenrick and five clear of James Cleverly who was eliminated.

Personal life

She is married to Hamish Badenoch; they have two daughters and a son. Hamish works for Deutsche Bank and was a Conservative councillor from 2014 to 2018 on Merton Borough Council. He also contested Foyle for the Northern Ireland Conservatives at the 2015 general election.

Kemi Badenoch was a board member of the Charlton Triangle Homes housing association until 2016, and was also a school governor at St Thomas the Apostle College in Southwark, and the Jubilee Primary School.

Badenoch describes herself as an agnostic with cultural Christian values and notes that her maternal grandfather was a Methodist minister in Nigeria.

Badenoch's father died in February 2022 and she took bereavement leave from her ministerial duties for a brief period.

Kemi Badenoch facts for kids

Contents

Early life and education

Early career

Political career

London Assembly

Parliamentary career

Early tenure

Johnson government

2022 Leadership candidacy

Truss government

Sunak government

Opposition

Personal life

See also