Of all the 26 Tory MPs elected in the new intake, none has grabbed more headlines than Katie Lam. A former special adviser, musical scriptwriter and Goldman Sachs banker, the MP for the Weald of Kent has made a series of eye-catching interventions on grooming gangs and veterans’ prosecutions. So her growing band of admirers will be delighted that her talents have been recognised with a post in the revamped Shadow Cabinet. Lam succeeds James Cleverly as Shadow Secretary for Housing, Communities and Local Government. She is one several members of the 2024 intake to take their spots in the shadow cabinet today including Rebecca Paul at Culture and Harriet Cross at the Scotland Office.
Talented politicians tend to relish going up against the best. Lam will face off at the despatch box against Angela Rayner, one of the government’s most high-profile faces. A meaty agenda awaits her. Local government reorganisation is one of the more immediate challenges, with 10,000 councillors due for election next spring. Andy Burnham has made much of his party’s plans for the biggest house building boom since the war. Lam will be tasked with articulating the Conservative response, amid internal divides about how much the party ought to lean into being a YIMBY – Yes In My Back Yard – or NIMBY – Not In My Back Yard – party on house building. Plans for an Islamophobia definition offer a chance for Lam to make more of the arguments around culture and integration which she has done well since 2024.
Those in Kemi Badenoch’s team have been impressed by Lam’s skill as a media performance and hard work as a whip. ‘Katie will now take the fight to Angela Rayner and hold her to account for her chronic underperformance on her own house building targets’, said one party insider. Surrounded by a talented team, including Sam Bidwell, formerly of the Adam Smith Institute, Lam will enjoy grappling with these knotty questions and reshaping Tory thinking across swathes of public policy. At a time when the Conservatives are struggling to cut through on housing, appointing the charismatic and clever Lam to this role is a good way of getting more attention and better results.
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