{"id":794940,"date":"2026-10-07T15:24:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-07T15:24:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/794940\/"},"modified":"2026-10-07T15:24:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T15:24:14","slug":"tories-accused-of-prioritising-rich-voters-as-badenoch-lays-out-inheritance-tax-cut-plan-conservatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/794940\/","title":{"rendered":"Tories accused of prioritising rich voters as Badenoch lays out inheritance tax cut plan | Conservatives"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kemi Badenoch has announced that the Conservatives would abolish inheritance tax on family homes if elected, prompting criticism that she is prioritising cutting taxes for the rich.<\/p>\n

The Tory leader also said couples would be able to leave an additional tax-free sum of \u00a31m to their families as the party attempts to shore up its traditional base in southern England.<\/p>\n

The move would mean the number of families paying inheritance tax \u2013 currently less than 5% do so<\/a> \u2013 would fall by more than a half, Badenoch said, with the plan expected to be paid for from \u00a370bn in savings the party says it has identified.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy ambition is to abolish inheritance tax altogether, as soon as we can afford it,\u201d she told the Conservative party conference in Birmingham. \u201cI believe the people who work hard and save should be rewarded for that effort.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo this is my guarantee: no stamp duty when you buy your home, no mansion tax when you live in your home, and no inheritance tax on your home when you pass it to your children or grandchildren.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Tories\u2019 policy plans announced this week \u2013 including support with childcare<\/a> for those earning more than \u00a3100,000, repealing the mansion tax, and the inheritance tax plans \u2013 have been firmly focused on affluent middle-class voters, many of whom deserted the party at the last election.<\/p>\n

However, the inheritance tax plans are likely to raise fears about overheating the housing market, giving elderly homeowners an incentive to stay in large family homes rather than downsize. It also prompted accusations that the party was favouring the rich over struggling families.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Tax Justice UK said: \u201cKemi Badenoch has just announced a massive inheritance tax giveaway to some of the wealthiest people in Britain. This is a reckless policy that will deprive public services of cash when they most need them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reform UK suggested Badenoch\u2019s inheritance tax plans would only affect 2% of houses, the majority in London. Its finance spokesperson, Robert Jenrick, added: \u201cThe Tory party is looking after its own in Kensington, Reform is looking after the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Labour party chair and cabinet minister, Bridget Phillipson, said: \u201cThe Tories haven\u2019t changed. Kemi Badenoch has shown that the Tories\u2019 choice is to do nothing to help ordinary families struggling with the cost of social care, prioritising the wealthiest instead.\u201d<\/p>\n

The TUC\u2019s general secretary, Paul Nowak, said: \u201cThis is a tax paid only by the very richest estates \u2013 95% pay no inheritance tax at all. Cutting it would do nothing for ordinary people. This is the same old Tory playbook: cutting taxes for their rich mates and leaving working people to pick up the bill. They are a party for inherited wealth, not workers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Badenoch acknowledged that the party faced a long road to recovery after its defeat at the 2024 general election. Photograph: WPA\/Getty<\/p>\n

Despite the Tories appearing more united this week than they have done for years, Badenoch did acknowledge in her speech that the party, still polling lower than at the time of its catastrophic 2024 election defeat, faced a long path to recovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have changed our party. There is still a lot of work to do. People are looking through the shop window. They like what they see, but let\u2019s be honest, not enough of them are buying it. We need to fix that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Senior Tories have been urging Badenoch to focus more on the economy, which they hope will help them to win back millions of votes in their traditional heartlands, and to pivot away from culture wars and migration.<\/p>\n

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Badenoch added that economic growth would be the \u201ccentral organising principle\u201d of the next Conservative government, cutting red tape in areas such as planning, building a third runway at Heathrow and implementing a new energy policy, while also creating jobs.<\/p>\n

Most of her speech, however, was devoted to attacks on her opponents, with the Tories desperate to edge ahead of Reform UK in the polls and be seen once again as the main opposition party on the right.<\/p>\n

Badenoch rejected calls from within her own party to \u201cunite the right\u201d by striking a deal with Nigel Farage\u2019s party \u2013 reflecting warnings from her closest allies that doing so would risk toxifying the Conservative brand irrevocably.<\/p>\n

She said: \u201cA year ago, those politicians were measuring up the curtains for No 10. Now, some of them are measuring up the curtains for their prison cells. The circus goes on and on, and it will never stop because this is who Reform politicians are. So, to those who say \u2018unite the right\u2019, we are not uniting with that. People deserve better and we are going to give them better than that: character, conduct and standards matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Badenoch also drew a sharp dividing line with Reform on race, after Suella Braverman, the former Conservative home secretary who defected to Farage\u2019s party, suggested that minority ethnic people could not be English.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to explain to my son when we\u2019re watching our brilliant England team play football that some people don\u2019t think our black players are English,\u201d she said. \u201cI remember back in the day when Ian Wright and John Barnes were playing. Nobody was questioning whether they were English. We certainly didn\u2019t have sitting MPs questioning whether they were English.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe must not let these people take us backwards. That is not the country we are. Reform MPs are openly questioning people\u2019s identity. I don\u2019t know whether you\u2019ve noticed, but I am black. I am British. I am proud of my country. I\u2019m proud of our history, all that we have done, and all that we will do in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Badenoch acknowledged that last year her leadership of the party had been under intense pressure. But she added: \u201cLet me tell you, I\u2019m not someone who gets written off, and neither is the Conservative party. There is a reason our party is still here after 200 years. We have adapted to every single challenge and every single age, and we are doing it again.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kemi Badenoch has announced that the Conservatives would abolish inheritance tax on family homes if elected, prompting criticism…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":794941,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-794940","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=794940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/794940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/794941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=794940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=794940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=794940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}