Badenoch plotted to remove Sunak as PM months before election, book claims
Anthony Seldon’s book alleges Badenoch asked fellow Tory ministers ‘if anyone was interested in changing the captain’ Kemi Badenoch plotted with fellow Conservative cabinet ministers to remove Rishi Sunak as prime minister months before the general election, it has been claimed. Anthony Seldon, who has written political biographies of every prime minister since John Major, has alleged in a new book that Badenoch, who
Open original article- Ledger record
- #2700
- First seen
- 25 Aug 2026, 15:12 UTC
- Last checked
- 26 Aug 2026, 07:59 UTC
- Version history
- 1 version
- Current fingerprint
6a05498d6bb2...f7db53
Publisher layer
Recorded article metadata
- Publisher
- The Guardian
- Country
- England / United Kingdom
- Source published
- 25 Aug 2026, 15:05 UTC
- Source updated
- No update timestamp supplied
- Byline
- Peter Walker Senior political correspondent
- Section
- Conservatives
Anthony Seldon’s book alleges Badenoch asked fellow Tory ministers ‘if anyone was interested in changing the captain’ Kemi Badenoch plotted with fellow Conservative cabinet ministers to remove Rishi Sunak as prime minister months before the general election, it has been claimed. Anthony Seldon, who has written political biographies of every prime minister since John Major, has alleged in a new book that Badenoch, who
Change layer
Observed version timeline
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1
Badenoch plotted to remove Sunak as PM months before election, book claims
Anthony Seldon’s book alleges Badenoch asked fellow Tory ministers ‘if anyone was interested in changing the captain’ Kemi Badenoch plotted with fellow Conservative cabinet ministers to remove Rishi Sunak as prime minister months before the general election, it has been claimed. Anthony Seldon, who has written political biographies of every prime minister since John Major, has alleged in a new book that Badenoch, who
Changed fieldstitlebylinedescriptionTextcontentTextsourcePublishedAtsourceUpdatedAtsectionimageUrltags- Version SHA-256
6a05498d6bb2...f7db53- Capture SHA-256
9bce119a647a...1e5501
Interpretation layer
Labels with declared origins
Publisher categories are copied from source metadata. Machine signals report observable wording or format and do not determine truth, intent, ethics, or wrongdoing.
- machine content-type Reported news observable-rules-v1 / 70% rule confidence
- machine language-signal Allegation language observable-rules-v1 / 65% rule confidence
- publisher category Biography books rss-category
- publisher category Books rss-category
- publisher category Conservatives rss-category
- publisher category Kemi Badenoch rss-category
- publisher category Politics rss-category
- publisher category Rishi Sunak rss-category
- publisher category UK news rss-category
Public response layer
Reception snapshots
Comment counts and samples remain absent until a lawful, source-specific capture method is reviewed. Absence is recorded instead of estimated.
Evidence layer
Capture provenance
- Capture ID
- #2416
- Observed
- 25 Aug 2026, 15:12 UTC
- HTTP result
- 200 / parsed
- Raw payload
- 480,940 bytes, private gzip evidence
- Collector
- news-ledger/0.1
- Public boundary
- metadata and excerpt