Tory leader Kemi Badenoch used her keynote speech to deliberately frame the next election as a “battle for the soul of this nation” between Labour and the Conservatives, conveniently ignoring Reform UK.

At their annual conference in Birmingham, the Tories have used a strategy designed to capitalise on polling showing that twice as many voters trust the Tories on the economy as Nigel Farage’s party. The hope is to portray the Tories as the natural right-wing opposition to Labour. Her party, Badenoch pointed out, was 200 years old and had met “every single challenge in every single age”. She compared the Tories to M&S, once written off as stuffy and unviable, now hosting its own runway shows.

“M&S is back in fashion. Just like M&S, we must learn from our mistakes, win back trust and make people feel good about our party again,” she said.

A confident Badenoch showed she is by far the best of the bunch. No wonder the party loves her. The rest of them are like a bunch of energy-saving lightbulbs, competing at the conference this week to see who can offer the lowest-wattage speeches to empty halls.

Guest speaker Jeremy Clarkson made possibly the best joke when he told delegates half of them had come dressed as seats. They even raised the floors in some rooms to trick the eye into thinking the rooms were full. But the non-existent queues at the conference bar told their own story.

Like children scaring themselves with ghost stories, the Tories tell themselves there might be an election next year. Belying this is a deliberate mid-term approach showing how the........

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