To play devil’s advocate, part of being in opposition is to give parties a chance to reassess what’s important to them. Kemi wasn’t particularly senior when they were in government and the shadow cabinet has changed from the actual cabinet when they were in power.

Political parties are extremely top driven in the UK with the PM or LOTO having an outsized role in shaping what their offering will be in the next manifesto. Being in power also changes decision making like Tories can now be all in favour of online privacy and civil liberties in a way they couldn’t when they were running the home office. Similar shift in priority for Starmer being emboldened to further purge the left of his party more blatantly than when they were in opposition.