LAURA Kuenssberg called out Tory leadership contender Kemi Badenoch for refusing to appear on her flagship BBC show on Sunday morning.
Kuenssberg said that Badenoch had declined to take audience questions despite her rival, Robert Jenrick, having done so.
Speaking on Sunday morning, the BBC host told viewers: “In a fortnight, we will find out whether Robert Jenrick or Kemi Badenoch will be the new leader of the opposition.
“Last week, Robert Jenrick was here and game enough to take your tough questions.
“Kemi Badenoch, despite our invitation to do the same, has so far declined.”
It comes after Badenoch also refused to take part in a BBC Question Time special unless every person in the audience was a paid-up member of the Conservative Party.
She did take part in a two-hour broadcast alongside Jenrick on GB News, which agreed to let them have an audience of only Tory Party members.
The news comes as both Badenoch and Jenrick spoke to the Sunday papers in a bid to lay out their stall.
Speaking to the Sunday Telegraph, Jenrick pledged to repeal the Climate Change Act and the Equality Act if he became prime minister.
Jenrick has already said the UK should leave the European Convention on Human Rights but widened his attack to cover a range of Blair-era laws that he said prevented ministers from making the decisions they wanted to.
In an interview with The Times, Badenoch said there needed to be more discussion of the role of fathers in parenting, adding the party had too often focused on single mothers in the past.
It came in the wake of a row over comments by veteran Tory MP Christopher Chope, a supporter of Jenrick, in which he said the mother-of-three was “preoccupied,” telling ITV “you can’t spend all your time with your family” while leader of the opposition.
Jenrick distanced himself from Chope’s comments, describing them as “definitely wrong”.
