Kemi Badenoch Calls Andy Burnham’s Female Allies His ‘Handmaidens’

Kemi Badenoch has been criticised after comparing the female allies around Andy Burnham to his “handmaidens”.

The Tory leader said they were merely “window dressing” as Labour once again prepares to make a man its leader.

Burnham is widely expected to succeed Keir Starmer after the PM announced he was resigning last Monday.

The new MP for Makerfield is currently the only person to formally announce his intention to run to be the next Labour leader and de facto prime minister.

If he gets into No.10, as expected, it means Labour will have missed another opportunity to appoint its first female leader.

At a press conference on Monday, Badenoch – the Conservatives’ fourth female leader – tore into Labour for still not choosing a woman to lead the party.

Asked about comments reported by the Spectator that some in Labour think Burnham would be the party’s first female leader in all but sex, Badenoch replied: “I don’t know what to say.

“The idea that Andy Burnham is Labour’s first female prime minister shows that that party still doesn’t know what a woman is.”

The Tories have often accused Labour of not “knowing what a woman is” amid culture wars around transgender people’s rights.

Badenoch continued: “But I’ve also found it very interesting how Labour women have been so much in a hurry to carry his bags and be his handmaiden and be at the front of his, of his, his photo pool.

“Why would you allow yourselves to be used as window dressing in this way?”

Her use of “handmaiden” likely refers to Margaret Atwood’s dystopian hit novel and the TV series, The Handmaid’s Tale, where women’s rights are completely eroded.

Burnham has been pictured surrounded by female aides on a handful of occasions, and is expected to appoint women MPs to key roles in government to counterbalance Labour’s lack of female leaders.

He has a strong body of support from influential women in the party, including ex-deputy prime minister Angela Rayner, former transport secretary Louise Haigh and deputy Labour leader Lucy Powell.

In response to Badenoch’s speech, key Burnham ally Anneliese Midgley wrote on X: “Stay classy, Kemi.”

A female Labour source told HuffPost UK: “Is she for real? Does she just say this stuff to attention seek, or does she actually genuinely think that women in senior political roles are just there to be exploited by men. She’s grim.”

The Conservative leader also used her speech to compare energy secretary Ed Miliband, the soft-left MP who could be appointed as Burnham’s chancellor, to “Nigerian military dictators”.

She said: “Yes, Ed Miliband is acting like the Nigerian military dictators who ruined a lot of that country’s economic potential and made it so much poorer and in some cases bankrupted the country.”

Badenoch claimed that the UK would be heading for a “summer of chaos” if Burnham became prime minister, too.

“Difficult problems need solving, and difficult decisions must be taken,” she said.

“But the man who will be prime minister in a couple of weeks wants a three-month summer holiday, because he needs some time to work out what he thinks.

“He will spend the next three months with unions and left-wing think tanks demanding policy changes which no one voted for.

“Andy Burnham is already the prime minister in everything but name. He must put an end to speculation, walk into No 10, name his cabinet, and come to Parliament to tell the country what he plans to do.

“Instead, he is allowing speculation and this chaos to run and run. He has clearly learned nothing from the disastrous speculation of Rachel Reeves’ last budget.”

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