It’s been another deeply uncomfortable day for the Tories, where the line to take on an issue of racism has collapsed at the last minute. Unsurprisingly, that collapse has also once again involved Kemi Badenoch.

Ministers and Downing Street have spent the day refusing to say the word ‘racist’ when discussing the comments made by party donor Frank Hester about Diane Abbott. To recap, he was reported by the Guardian to have said in 2019 that ‘you see Diane Abbott on the TV, and you’re just like … you just want to hate all Black women because she’s there. And I don’t hate all black women at all, but I think she should be shot.’

This is not the first time ministers have spent all day on message, only for that message to be blown out of the water by Badenoch

Hester has now apologised for the comments, something Graham Stuart and Downing Street have leaned on heavily when asked whether what he said was ‘racist’. Stuart was on the morning broadcast round, and said the language was ‘reprehensible’, while Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride said:

‘I think the critical point here is I don’t think what he was saying was a gender-based or a race-based comment, but it was clearly inappropriate. He has apologised and I think we need to move on from that.’

No 10, meanwhile, insisted that ‘what is alleged and reported to have been said is clearly unacceptable’, but refused to add to that. And then along came Badenoch, who once again took to Twitter, this time to say the following:

‘Hester’s 2019 comments, as reported, were racist. I welcome his apology. Abbott and I disagree on a lot. But the idea of linking criticism of her, to being a black woman is appalling. It’s never acceptable to conflate someone’s views with the colour of their skin. MPs have a difficult job balancing multiple interests – often under threats of intimidation as we saw recently in parliament. Some people make flippant comments without thinking of this context. This is why there needs to be space for forgiveness where there is contrition.’

This is not the first time ministers have spent all day on message, only for that message to be blown out of the water by a Badenoch tweet. The problem is that the message they were sent out to offer was so useless that it made them sound like malfunctioning AI bots, as opposed to humans, and Badenoch once again saw an opportunity to speak plainly. So, along came the Downing Street clarification:

‘The comments allegedly made by Frank Hester were racist and wrong. He has now rightly apologised for the offence caused and where remorse is shown it should be accepted. The Prime Minister is clear there is no place for racism in public life and as the first British-Asian Prime Minister leading one of the most ethnically diverse Cabinets in our history, the UK is living proof of that fact.’

The Prime Minister’s spokesman has an extremely difficult job, often dealing with the press before his boss has decided what he thinks about an issue (I recently interviewed a former PMOS, James Slack, about how agonising these sessions could be). But Sunak had overnight and all day to make up his mind, while his ministers had to carry on putting their names to a daft line. There’s nothing that annoys politicians more than a change of line after they’ve been humiliated on a broadcast round: Sunak is lucky that Stuart and Stride aren’t troublesome types. But many of their colleagues are.