Shadow chancellor Mel Stride has distanced himself from Robert Jenrick's controversial comments about not seeing 'another white face' in Handsworth, Birmingham. Speaking at a Politico fringe meeting at the Conservative Party conference, Stride said: 'Those are not words that I would have used.' He added that while he does not believe Jenrick is a racist, 'everybody chooses their own words'.
Stride is the first senior Tory to publicly distance himself from Jenrick over the remarks, which Kemi Badenoch has been defending throughout the day. The comments have sparked accusations of racism, with former counter-extremism commissioner Dame Sara Khan stating: 'I do believe it's a racist comment.' She criticised Jenrick for focusing solely on skin colour rather than integration.
Badenoch defended Jenrick in a BBC interview, arguing that a lack of integration could lead Britain to 'a very dark place'. She cited the recent terrorist attack in Manchester as an example of poor integration. Meanwhile, Labour has accused Jenrick of resorting to personal attacks after he compared Attorney General Lord Hermer to a mafia lawyer.
In other conference developments, Badenoch repeatedly avoided answering whether she admires Nigel Farage, deflecting questions by asking why the media focuses on him instead of Keir Starmer or Ed Davey. Nursing leaders have also warned that the NHS and social care would cease to function under new government rules for foreign staff, which hundreds of medics have condemned as 'divisive and xenophobic'.
