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Kemi Badenoch has caused an eruption at the Tory party conference after she was forced to backtrack on an attack on statutory maternity pay by initially claiming it was “excessive”.
The Tory leadership contender on Sunday said the government was doing “too much” on statutory maternity pay, before backtracking on the remarks.
But her comments were seized upon by leadership rivals Robert Jenrick and Tom Tugendhat in a row that ensured hopes the conference would avoid “blue on blue” infighting were dashed.
Describing statutory maternity pay as “a function of tax”, Ms Badencoh told Times Radio: “Tax comes from people who are working: we’re taking from one group of people and giving to another. This, in my view, is excessive.”
Arguing that businesses are having to close because of the burden of regulation, she added: “We need to allow businesses, especially small businesses, to make more of their own decisions.”
Mr Jenrick, one of the four contenders for the Conservative leadership, when asked about Ms Badenoch’s remarks said that the party should be “firmly on the side of parents and working mums”.
Speaking at a fringe event at the conference, Mr Jenrick said: “I don’t agree with Kemi on this one. I am a father of three young daughters. I want to see them get the support they need when they enter the workplace.
“Our maternity pay is among the lowest in the OECD. I think the Conservative Party should be firmly on the side of parents and working mums who are trying to get on.”
He added that there are “plenty of other ways that we can help small businesses to prosper other than targeting maternity pay”.
While Mr Tugendhat claimed not to know the context of Ms Badenoch’s remarks, he added that it was important for women to be able to choose.
“I do know that it is incredibly important that women have the ability to choose how to live their lives,” he said. “It’s not for me to tell you whether you should go to work or stay at home, or which job to do, or how many kids to have – that’s none of my business,” he told an event with the Conservative Women’s Organisation.
“What’s my business as a politician is to make sure that you have the support for choice.”
Ms Badenoch later hit back at her rivals as she retreated from her earlier remarks.
A person close to Ms Badenoch’s campaign said that “infighting and internal conflicts helped take our party to an historic defeat” and accused other candidates of seeking to “score political hits”.
They said: “We need to be better, we need our politics to be better. Kemi obviously supports maternity pay and was making a case for lower regulation – something she always aimed for as business secretary.
“For other leadership campaigns to be seeking to use selective quotes from an interview to score political hits, shows they’re still wedded to the old politics and simply aren’t serious about getting back to government.”
Meanwhile, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) said the former business secretary was “out of touch” over the claim.
General secretary Paul Nowak said: “The Conservative Party leadership candidates are hopelessly out of touch and seem to be competing with one another to be the most unkind and nasty.
“Maternity pay in the UK is lower than in many other economies – forcing too many mums back from leave early.”
Ms Badenoch claimed that businesses were closing because “the burden of regulation is too high”, adding: “We need to allow businesses, especially small businesses, to make more of their own decisions.
“The exact amount of maternity pay, in my view, is neither here nor there. We need to make sure that we are creating an environment where people can work and people can have more freedom to make their individual decisions.”
When it was put to her that the amount of maternity pay was important for people who cannot otherwise afford to have a baby, Ms Badenoch said: “We need to have more personal responsibility. There was a time when there wasn’t any maternity pay and people were having more babies.”
Ms Badenoch later wrote on X/Twitter that, “contrary to what some have said”, she does support maternity pay.
Labour Party chairman Ellie Reeves said: “It is symptomatic of the Conservative Party as a whole that this is the kind of intervention that one of their leadership contenders is coming out with. The Tories and their continuity candidates are completely unserious about the problems they inflicted on the country over 14 years of chaos and decline."
And Joeli Brearley, founder of campaign group Pregnant Then Screwed, said it is “absolute nonsense” to suggest that businesses are closing because of statutory maternity pay, because they are able to recoup the cost from HMRC.
She said: “Statutory maternity pay is absolutely vital. Most families need two incomes to survive, and so without SMP, women would be forced to return to work almost immediately after giving birth.
“Maternity leave has been proven to substantially decrease infant mortality whilst improving the mental and physical health of women.
“Conservatives are meant to be the party of family – this statement from Badenoch is yet another example of dog-whistle politics that would actively damage families, businesses and society as a whole.”
It came on the first day of the Conservative Party conference in Birmingham, where the race to succeed Rishi Sunak as leader will take centre stage.
First introduced in 1987, statutory maternity pay is available only to women who are employed and earning an average of at least £123 per week. It provides 90 per cent of a person’s salary for six weeks, and then whichever is lower: 90 per cent of their salary, or £184.03, every week for the next 33 weeks. The payment is liable for income tax and national insurance.
