The excitement was palpable.
Billed as the “biggest policy renewal programme in 50 years”; 136 days since becoming Tory leader, Kemi Badenoch’s big policy pitch.
Politics latest: Billions shaved off welfare bill
But don’t expect to be overwhelmed by the detail.
Today’s headline announcement – that net zero by 2050 is “impossible” – is the beginning, I’m told, of a journey setting out the direction of travel first, policy meat will come later.
“A very sensible approach,” a senior Tory tells me before the speech.
She could certainly push Labour on to uncomfortable territory on climate targets.
Publicly, her party are rallying – but behind the scenes, it’s not difficult to find Conservative MPs who think she has failed to cut through.
Big tests on the horizon
“I think we did expect more by now,” one MP, who backed her for the leadership, tells me.
Is Mrs Badenoch, like Margaret Thatcher, being underestimated by her colleagues early on in her leadership?
Or was she overestimated by the party when they elected her leader?
“I’m not going to pretend I don’t have critics,” Mrs Badenoch tells me.
“I’m just asking people to listen to what I am saying.”
What’s interesting is the wider Conservative Party machine seem happier than MPs in parliament.
Insiders at the Tory HQ tell me MPs are being bogged down by, for example, her performance at PMQs, which doesn’t cut through with the public.
And it’s not long until we know what is cutting through. The local elections in May (and a by-election in Runcorn and Helsby) will be Mrs Badenoch’s first big electoral test.
Read more:
All Labour’s…
