Overview
- In a new interview, Kemi Badenoch vowed a zero-tolerance crackdown on shoplifting, vandalism and public drug use backed by funding for 10,000 extra police officers.
- She said a Conservative government would leave the European Convention on Human Rights to make deportations easier and deter illegal migration.
- She backed wider stop-and-search, live facial recognition in crime hot spots and on-the-spot fines for graffiti, which she said would deliver immediate justice and help catch about 24,000 offenders at large.
- She targeted Reform, claiming its councillors brought chaos in Kent and broke council tax promises, and she said the Conservatives are more united after recent defections to Reform.
- Looking to London, she said the Tories could win back Westminster, Wandsworth and Barnet and urged a pause on pro-Gaza marches, which she linked to rising antisemitism.