'Delusion, M&S and Kemi': GB News's insider diary of Conservative Party Conference

Kemi Badenoch's closing speech was greeted with round after round of applause.

Adoring members leapt to their feet for their leader and could not get enough of her throughout the four-day Tory jamboree in Birmingham.

Polling consistently suggests the enthusiasm stretches beyond the hall, with Mrs Badenoch more popular with voters than even Nigel Farage.

For the Conservative Party, however, it is another story.

A More in Common poll released moments before she took to the stage put the Conservatives third on 21 per cent, three points behind Reform UK on 24.

Labour, meanwhile, climbed to 29 per cent, their highest since 2024, leaving the Tories cheering a leader the public appears to rate more highly than the party she leads.

But not everyone was convinced Mrs Badenoch had done enough to turn the dial, with one former Tory aide offering a blunt verdict: "It was fine but nothing special."

Despite the Tory leader's push to look to the future, nostalgia was firmly on the menu for many members at the ICC, with gravy jugs of Margaret Thatcher and Boris Johnson flying off the shelves.

However, punters did not come forward for Theresa May, David Cameron or John Major, and the Tories' merchandise team did not even bother to put Rishi Sunak or Liz Truss up for sale.

And Mrs Badenoch's Shadow Cabinet colleagues went down like a cup of cold soup on the conference floor.

Mrs Badenoch's new Shadow Chancellor, Andrew Griffith, delivered a stilted, applause-hungry turn, pausing pointedly for claps that arrived late, if at all.

His finale was so awkward the hall was left wondering whether he had actually finished.

"That was terrible," was one Westminster veteran's less forgiving review.

Mrs Badenoch, by contrast, knew exactly how to win the room.

The Leader of the Opposition could not resist giving a glowing tribute to a staple supermarket for Tory members.

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

• Tories reveal plot to block Nigel Farage from No10 in tactical vote push for anti-Reform voters
• Kemi Badenoch won't accept return of Reform defectors as Tories set sights on Nigel Farage's voters
• Kemi Badenoch refuses to commit to restoring triple lock before unveiling youth working plan

After 50 minutes setting out her vision for Britain, Mrs Badenoch saved her final sales pitch for Marks & Spencer.

The Tory leader told delegates the retailer had been around for 100 years but was once written off as "a bit stuffy and stuck in the past".

There were even doubts, she said, over whether it would survive at all.

"Do you see where I'm going with this Conference?" she asked as the penny dropped around the hall.

M&S, she declared, is now "back in fashion" thanks to "great looks at affordable prices".

She confessed she had been among the shoppers flooding back, a fact delegates had probably spotted from her outfits all week.

The plug was well placed, with More in Common polling putting the Tories on 33 per cent among M&S weekly shoppers, a comfortable eight points ahead of Labour.

Step outside the food hall, however, and the party slips to third at Asda, Aldi, Lidl and Morrisons.

Even Waitrose, once a quintessential Tory chain, now leans Labour.

Not that it troubled one Tory MP, who was overheard saying: "My local Waitrose is about two hours away."

Away from the main stage, one word kept cropping up among think tank wonks, retired Tory foot soldiers and assorted Westminster floaters: delusion.

The conference itself felt noticeably quiet, with the halls and corridors largely overrun by young Tory boys.

There was no need to queue for an overpriced beer at the Hyatt hotel, not that its screens would have been showing GB News anyway.

But The People's Channel did spot just two members dancing the night away in an empty flag-clad hall while a live band was playing a song that sounded, to one passerby, like elevator music.

One Tory veteran was blunter about the mood in Birmingham.

"I think this conference has been rather dull," they admitted.

"If they think they're going to beat Reform as they are today, they have a long way to go."