Professor Sir John Curtice (Image: Getty)
Neither Kemi Badenoch nor Robert Jenrick are likely to save the Tories, according to Britain's top pollster.
Professor Sir John Curtice suggested the final two Conservative leadership candidates would not be able to unite the Right after voters abandoned the party for Reform UK at the general election.
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He also claimed the shadow housing secretary and ex-immigration minister do not have an “an adequate understanding of why their party suffered its worst-ever electoral result in July”.
Writing in the Independent, Prof Curtice said: "Both candidates appear to believe the fault lies in a failure of the last government to be true to Conservative values.
"Rather than seeking to limit the size of the state, it presided over the biggest expansion since 1945 – thanks, of course, to the pandemic and the cost of living crisis.
"Rather than curbing immigration and challenging wokery, it presided over record levels of immigration and accepted too much of the equality and diversity agenda."
Tory leadership hopefuls Robert Jenrick and Kemi Badenoch (Image: Getty)
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However, Prof Curtice argued that the partygate row surrounding Boris Johnson and Liz Truss's mini-budget were to blame for the Tories' "precipitous fall from grace".
He added: "No reversion to 'true' Conservative values is going to erase these stains on the party’s copybook."
Prof Curtice said Tory members would have to "guess – and hope" when it comes to backing one of the contestants as neither has "much of a public profile".
He concluded that as “largely unknown quantities”, Ms Badenoch and Mr Jenrick may "prove able to surprise us".
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The polling expert added: “Though in order to do so, they are both certainly going to have to reveal a wider range of political talents than they have so far."
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It comes as Conservative Party members start to cast their ballots from Thursday in the race to replace Rishi Sunak after MPs chose the final two candidates.
Shadow home secretary James Cleverly, widely seen as the most centrist hopeful, was knocked out last week in a major upset after he had emerged as the favourite during the Tory conference.
The new leader will be announced on November 2.