
Kemi Badenoch mocked for basic Scotland-Wales gaffe
The Tory leader is having a hard enough time of it watching her party haemorrhage voters and members to Nigel Farage's hard-right Reform UK, let alone the reputational damage she's suffering from her dismal performances at Prime Minister's Questions.
Now, it seems Badenoch is confused even about where she is.
For clarity: the Tory leader is in Wales for the Welsh Conservative conference this Friday. Maybe one of her aides could let her know.
Because somewhere on the way to Llangollen, Badenoch got a bit turned around.
Speaking to the Welsh Tory conference in the Welsh town, Badenoch said it had been 'wonderful to meet so many MSPs'.
Except, as keen-eyed readers will know, MSP stands for Member of the Scottish Parliament …
Badenoch almost certainly meant to say she had met Members of the Senedd – the Welsh Parliament. But who can tell the devolved nations apart anyway.
Welsh journalist Will Hayward shared the gaffe on Bluesky, leading one user to say: 'Obviously the catastrophic sequence of Johnson, Truss and Sunak is responsible for the (very pleasing) destruction of the modern Tory party, but it'll always be hilarious that they chose Badenoch to oversee their funeral and postmortem.'
A second added: 'Making a run for 'worst leader of a political party', but still a long way to go to match Starmer's performance this week.'
And a third quipped in response: 'But she doesn't make gaffes …'
(Image: BBC) The reference is to Badenoch's increasingly infamous claim, made more than once, that she has 'never' had a gaffe and does not make them …
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Glasgow Times
3 hours ago
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Sturgeon: ‘Witch-hunt' MSPs investigating me were being directed by Salmond
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She said that she felt 'on trial' as part of a wider phenomenon that when men were accused of impropriety, 'some people's first instinct is to find a woman to blame'. Ms Sturgeon did admit to 'misplaced trust and poor judgment' in her autobiography, which was published early by Waterstones on Monday, having been slated for release this Thursday. From a shy childhood in working class Ayrshire to wielding power in the corridors of Holyrood, Scotland's longest serving First Minister @NicolaSturgeon shares her incredible story in FRANKLY, coming this August. Signed Edition: — Waterstones (@Waterstones) March 19, 2025 She wrote: 'This feeling of being on trial was most intense when it came to the work of the Scottish Parliament committee set up to investigate the Scottish government's handling of the original complaints against Alex. 'From day one, it seemed clear that some of the opposition members of the committee were much less interested in establishing facts, or making sure lessons were learned, than they were in finding some way to blame it all on me. 'If it sometimes felt to me like a 'witch-hunt', it is probably because for some of them that is exactly what it was. 'I was told, and I believe it to be true, that some of the opposition MSPs were taking direction from Alex himself – though possibly through an intermediary – on the points to pursue and the questions to ask.' Ms Sturgeon described the inquiry, to which she gave eight hours of sworn evidence, as 'gruelling' but also 'cathartic'. MSPs voted five to four that she misled them. Nicola Sturgeon said her famed relationship with Alex Salmond began to deteriorate when she became first minister (Andrew Milligan/PA) The politicians began their inquiry after a judicial review in 2019 found the Scottish Government's investigation into Mr Salmond's alleged misconduct was unlawful, unfair and tainted by apparent bias. Mr Salmond, who died last year, was awarded £500,000 in legal expenses. Ms Sturgeon wrote of the inquiry: 'It also gave the significant number of people who tuned in to watch the chance to see for themselves just how partisan some of the committee members were being. 'Not surprisingly, the opposition majority on the committee managed to find some way of asserting in their report that I had breached the ministerial code. 'However, it was the verdict of the independent Hamilton report that mattered.' She said her infamous falling out with her predecessor was a 'bruising episode' of her life as she accused Mr Salmond of creating a 'conspiracy theory' to defend himself from reckoning with misconduct allegations, of which he was cleared in court. Ms Sturgeon said her former mentor was 'never able to produce a shred of hard evidence that he was' the victim of a conspiracy. Nicola Sturgeon accused Alex Salmond of creating a conspiracy to shield himself from his reckoning with his own behaviour (Robert Perry/PA) She went on: 'All of which begs the question: how did he manage to persuade some people that he was the wronged party, and lead others to at least entertain the possibility? 'In short, he used all of his considerable political and media skills to divert attention from what was, for him, the inconvenient fact of the whole business. 'He sought to establish his conspiracy narrative by weaving together a number of incidents and developments, all of which had rational explanations, into something that, with his powers of persuasion, he was able to cast as sinister.' Ms Sturgeon speaks about Mr Salmond several times in her autobiography, which also has a dedicated chapter to him, simply titled 'Alex Salmond'. In it, she speaks of an 'overwhelming sense of sadness and loss' when she found out about his death, which she said hit her harder than she had anticipated. Ms Sturgeon says the breakdown in their relationship happened long before Mr Salmond's misconduct allegations. She said it had begun to deteriorate when she became first minister in 2014 following his resignation in light of the independence referendum defeat. Ms Sturgeon claims her former boss still wanted to 'call the shots' outside of Bute House and appeared unhappy that she was no longer his inferior. She also accuses him of trying to 'distort' and 'weaponise' his alleged victims' 'trauma' through his allegations of conspiracy. Ms Sturgeon claims that Mr Salmond, who later quit the SNP to form the Alba Party, would rather have seen the SNP destroyed than be successful without him. Despite her myriad claims against her predecessor, though, Ms Sturgeon said: 'Part of me still misses him, or at least the man I thought he was and the relationship we once had. 'I know I will never quite escape the shadow he casts, even in death.'