Kemi Badenoch is about to make life very difficult for Keir Starmer

Based on their first public clash, it’s clear the new Conservative leader has something the prime minister doesn’t, writes John Rentoul – the ability to be conversational and direct

The prime minister was formulaic and scripted in comparison, writes John Rentoul (Getty/Getty)

The Labour Party is afraid of Kemi Badenoch. We know this because Keir Starmer was better prepared than usual for Prime Minister’s Questions, and the government whips orchestrated a lot of noise to try to put her off.

On the evidence of their first clash, Labour is right to be afraid of her. She was conversational and direct, and came across as a real person with a pulse. After Starmer responded to her questions by talking about “fixing the foundations” and a “£22bn black hole”, she accused him of “scripted” answers. He shot back that it would have been “best not to have read that from a piece of paper”, which was a more agile and effective retort than usual, but she had made her point: that he came across as a lawyer or public relations flack reading out a carefully worded defence of his client.

She had in fact dispensed with the iPad that she used as a minister – which she brought into the chamber – and relied instead on a few handwritten notes, in contrast to Starmer’s big folder of printed text (with photos of MPs listed to ask questions in the corner).

She asked questions designed to make life difficult for Starmer. She did not care that suggesting that Donald Trump be invited to address parliament would put her on the wrong side of public opinion. She was interested only in the awkward diplomatic tangle for a prime minister and foreign secretary who have said rude things about the president-elect, and whose party hates him.

She also asked about defence spending – a Trump-related sensitive subject, because if the new US president withdraws funding for Ukraine that means European members of Nato will have to spend more. She blundered by saying that Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, hadn’t mentioned defence in her Budget – a simple factual mistake – and Starmer had a good prepared line in response: saying that the last time UK defence spending was as high as 2.5 per cent of national income was under the last Labour government. But it was a “scripted” answer, which has no bearing on what defence spending might be in future.

Finally, she asked about farmers. Again, if she was interested in simply currying favour with the voters, she might have asked instead about the tax on jobs – the rise in employers’ national insurance contributions – but the tax changes on farms are more of a pressing problem for the government, having provoked a passionate and vocal interest group.

The Labour benches erupted with a roar that sounded a bit like class war, while Starmer gave a legalistic answer about the “vast majority” of farmers being unaffected.

She had announced her arrival – and the Labour side of the Commons sensed a change.

Starmer had paid her the highest compliment of raising his game. Although he “doesn’t answer the questions, he just reads out the lines officials have prepared for him”, as Badenoch pointed out, they were better lines than usual, and he read them out with more conviction and better timing than we are used to.

Labour backbenchers, meanwhile, asked Starmer one question after another about embarrassing things that Badenoch had said. We started with Jacob Collier asking about her comment that maternity pay had “gone too far”. Neil Coyle asked about “this week’s leader of the Tory party” expressing scepticism about the minimum wage. Mary Glindon wanted to know what the prime minister thought about Badenoch’s view that the scandal of lockdown parties in Downing Street was “overblown”.

Starmer had opened proceedings by welcoming his fourth Tory leader to the despatch box in four and a half years, but the fusillade of attacks on her did not suggest that they think she will come and go like William Hague, Iain Duncan Smith and Michael Howard before her.

She came across as a different kind of leader, with passion, warmth and humour, up against a formulaic and scripted opponent. Prime Minister’s Questions is going to be worth watching over the next few years.