Kemi Badenoch: Only Chainsawnomics Can Fix Britain

On his very first day as a congressman in 2021, a journalist asked Javier Milei, trying to mock him, what two lonely deputies could possibly do in a chamber of 257. Milei did not flinch. He solemnly quoted Maccabees 3:19: “Victory in battle does not depend on the number of soldiers, but on the forces that come from Heaven.” Then he walked on.

Two years later, armed with little more than a chainsaw, an anti–status quo libertarian discourse, and a Twitter account, Milei won the presidency with more than 56% of the popular vote in the runoff. “The forces of Heaven” became the rallying cry of a movement that believes in him and refuses to accept the fatalism of decline.

And now, those same forces of Heaven may have found a new lieutenant — not in South America, but in Britain. Her name is Kemi Badenoch.

A New Conservative Voice

On Thursday 13 November, at the Argentina–UK  Summit hosted by Canning House, the Conservative leader of the opposition delivered a bold, confident speech praising President Milei’s conviction and the early success of his radical turnaround.

She drew clear parallels between Argentina’s recent past and Britain’s current troubles: high debt, budget deficits, soaring interest payments, weak productivity, skills shortages, and capital flight.

Against this backdrop, Badenoch argued, the Labour government in Britain is doing the exact opposite of Milei — expanding spending, bureaucracy, and taxation while driving Britain deeper into stagnation.

Her Solution: Take a Leaf Out of Milei’s book

While “every other party in Britain is offering left-wing solutions — more spending, more borrowing, more regulation, more taxes”, Badenoch insisted that Conservatives must be the party of personal responsibility and limited government.

But to win, she said, they must change minds. As Milei has shown, “more government spending isn’t kind — it’s cruel.”

If you have a plan, she argued, and can bring the public with you, change can happen quickly.

Badenoch ended with optimism. Like Milei, she rejects fatalistic decline. Both believe their nations’ best days lie ahead, if they have the courage to change course. She pledged friendship with Argentina and a renewed effort to expand trade.

Can She Lead Britain Away from Decline?

Badenoch has shown she understands the diagnosis. She knows the Conservatives must persuade the public, not merely manage decline. But articulating it is one thing; carrying it through is another.

We see four challenges ahead:

1. The challenge of scale

Perhaps because Britain starts from a better position than Argentina, Badenoch claims Britain “doesn’t need quite the same shock therapy.” But the opposite may be true.

Argentina, starting from a far worse baseline, can now reallocate resources quickly once the budget has been balanced. Moreover, it is a federal country: dismantling a centralised state by invoking the principle of subsidiarity is relatively straightforward.

The UK, by contrast, must rethink the entire architecture of the state. Everything must be on the table — who taxes, who spends, who designs education, health, housing, disability benefits, public broadcasting, policing. Britain is one of the most centralised and statist economies in the developed world. Reform here requires confronting every sacred cow.

2. The Conservative voter base

While Milei’s movement was fuelled by frustrated younger generations, the Conservative vote in Britain is overwhelmingly older, precisely the group most dependent on the welfare state that must be reformed.

To win younger voters, the Tories need a generational shift. They must show how their reforms benefit future generations and ask their current base to shoulder the sacrifice. Will the boomers finally accept their share of “blood, sweat and tears”?

3. The challenge of time and culture

Before Milei’s victory came a decade of cultural battle — teaching, debating, and building the moral foundations of liberty. Nothing comparable exists in Britain. Even within the Conservative Party, the language of moral capitalism is faint.

Yet Britain is uniquely placed to revive its classical liberal tradition and retell its own epic story of resistance to state overreach — from the Magna Carta and the peasants’ revolts against enclosure to Adam Smith and Burke. The material for a new libertarian-conservative narrative is abundant. What is needed now is to make it digestible, coherent, and compelling.

4. The challenge of conviction

Badenoch speaks of reforming the state into something “reasonable.” Milei declared war on it.

While Badenoch talks of doing “difficult things” because “they work,” Milei framed the struggle as moral. He defined the state and statism as enemies: the Leviathan that must be cut down for freedom to flourish. His rhetoric was moral first, economic second: prosperity is merely the proof that liberty works.

This is the crucial difference:

If capitalism is defended only for its efficiency, it will always lose to the politics of envy.

Saying “capitalism is cruel, but it increases GDP” concedes defeat from the outset.

The truth is the opposite: capitalism is moral because it is voluntary. Free exchange is consensual. That is what makes it just. The State, not capitalism, is the coercive monster, the Leviathan that robs individuals of agency and responsibility.

The Long Road Ahead

Can Badenoch inspire the moral passion needed to win hearts and minds and bring young people to the cause of liberty? Hard to say. Is the Conservative Party itself even convinced? It does not appear so. And time is running short before the next election.

But she has planted a seed. If she survives the next election and surrounds herself with a new generation of thinkers and reformers, she could lead a renaissance.

For now, we can only hope that Milei succeeds, because his victory could prove to the world, Britain included, that freedom works and the battle can be won.