Is Jenrick joining Reform?
Coffee House Shots
The Spectator
4.4 • 2.2K Ratings
🗓️ 15 January 2026
⏱️ 8 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Kemi Badenoch has sacked Robert Jenrick from the shadow cabinet, removed the Tory whip and suspended his party membership. In a video on X she claims, ‘I was presented with clear, irrefutable evidence that he was plotting in secret to defect in a way designed to be as damaging as possible’. The Tories compiled a bundle of evidence that included a dinner between Jenrick and Nigel Farage last month, and the fact that he had discussed switching to Reform with at least two allies. It is understood that he left a copy of his defection speech lying around, which included passages criticising Conservative colleagues. Is this – as we all suspect – the prelude to perhaps Reform's biggest coup yet?
Tim Shipman and James Heale discuss.
Produced by Megan McElroy and Oscar Edmondson.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, welcome to coffee house shots. I'm James Hill and I'm joined today by Tim Shipman, |
| 0:09.4 | the Spectators, political editor. Now, Tim, it's been an incredible morning in Westminster, of course, |
| 0:13.9 | because sensationally, Camus Baydock has sacked Robert Gemmrick from the Shederick, |
| 0:18.4 | she's taken away the party whip from him, and even cancelled his Conservative Party membership. |
| 0:22.6 | And this all comes because she accuses him of potentially going to defect to reform, having been offered irrefutable evidence of that. |
| 0:28.7 | Yes. I mean, look, we talk about sensations in politics a lot, but I'm not sure at some level that people would be surprised by this, but they're certainly shocked that |
| 0:38.1 | it's come in this way. Conservative sources saying that irrefutable proof is things that Robert |
| 0:43.8 | Jenrick's team apparently left lying around. You say is that digital messages, they said they've |
| 0:48.3 | got more than that. Our understanding is that a hard copy of a potential resignation speech, |
| 0:53.9 | at least a draft of one, was found. |
| 0:57.0 | And that that led Bader Knox team to believe that the defection was going to be what they call imminent. |
| 1:02.7 | The expectation was either in a Sunday newspaper, a Sunday political program, |
| 1:07.4 | or at one of those now famous reform reform press conferences first thing on a Monday morning |
| 1:11.8 | and Generic was going to appear and we believe reform sources saying confirming that Generic and Farage |
| 1:19.5 | met before Christmas and also that there has been regular contact since. Farage has just been |
| 1:26.4 | on the stage and has basically not denied the story |
| 1:29.6 | and said that he's very surprised it's come out in this way, but anyone who's followed non-denial |
| 1:34.8 | denials over the years knows that that is a basic confirmation that this was all on the cards. |
| 1:39.9 | And the thing that appears to be in that speech that has upset Bader Knox team more than |
| 1:44.7 | anything is that GENRIC appears to be criticising some of his shadow cabinet colleagues. |
| 1:48.9 | And in her statement we had Baderoc essentially saying that he was planning to do this in |
| 1:53.9 | the most damaging way possible. |
... |
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