Jenrick’s journey from Tory management hopeful to … Reform MP? How working-class ‘Bobby J’ from Wolverhampton went from Remainer reasonable to immigration hardliner

Robert Jenrick‘s unceremonious defenestration from the Conservative Party today ends a tumultuous chapter in a checkered political journey that has taken him from scandal-prone minister to leadership hopeful and then to outcast.

The former home secretary was kicked out of his shadow justice role and had his party membership cancelled by leader Kemi Badenoch today after she was handed what she said was clear evidence he planned to defect.

Mr Jenrick, who was pipped to the party leadership by Mrs Badenoch in late 2024, has long been tipped to abandon the struggling Tories and line up alongside Nigel Farage.

He had raise eyebrows among commentators and his own colleagues as he appeared to regard every brief in the shadow cabinet as part of his responsibility.

As well as his mid-ranking justice brief, he would frequently dip into his former home affairs speciality, the shadow chancellor’s role opposing the Treasury, defence, communities and housing to name a few. 

Last May he made headlines when he filmed himself approaching three men at Stratford station in East London in an attempt to show the extent of fare dodging in the capital.

He has also been the subject of comment over his noticeable weight loss, finally admitting he had used weight-loss drugs. 

While denying he was planning to defect to Reform he made several warm overtures towards Mr Farage, even when it went against Mrs Badenoch’s party line.    

In April he was recorded proposing a ‘coalition’ to unite Tory and Reform UK voters at the next election.

He told Conservative students that ‘one way or another’ centre-Right voters had to be united to ensure Keir Starmer does not ‘sail through the middle’ again.

But just six weeks ago he publicly denied he was going anywhere, telling Times Radio: ‘It wasn’t very long ago that I was running to be leader of the Conservative Party so I’m not going anywhere.’

And in 2024, Mr Farage branded the MP ‘Robert Remainer Generic’, a dig at his changing position on big issues and support for staying in the EU in 2016.

Mr Jenrick, who was born in Wolverhampton and raised in Shropshire, had working class parents but went on to attend Cambridge.

He trained as a solicitor and previously worked in corporate law at leading international law firms in London and Moscow. 

During his Tory leadership election campaign the father of three made much of his humble roots. In his speech to the conference last month he said: ’50 years ago, in 1974, my Dad, Bill, and my Mum, Jenny, came here to Birmingham.

‘Dad had a job at the last great iron foundry in the Black Country, in Coseley. A vast, Victorian metalworks that made the pots and pans of the Empire.’

He later posed with his parents and his wife, Michal Berkner, who is nine years his senior. 

The pair met at Skadden Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom – a New York law firm which has done work for Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs, including former Chelsea FC owner Roman Abramovich.

At the age of 19, in an interview with Cambridge student magazine Varsity in 2001, the history undergraduate was asked what he would like to be in 10 years’ time.

He replied: ‘A millionaire businessman fighting my first election to Parliament.’

After university he turned his attentions to business, working in senior commercial management at the world-famous global art firm Christie’s.

Having won Newark in a 2014 by-election (which included Nigel Farage), Theresa May promoted him to a Treasury minister in January 2018.

Ms May’s demise saw him climb higher, with Boris Johnson promoting him to secretary of state for housing, communities and local government when the former premier took office in July 2019.

But his time around the cabinet table ended in controversy, when he was sacked after a string of high-profile and damaging incidents, including the unlawful approval of a Tory donor’s housing development and eyebrow-raising journeys during lockdown.

Then PM Boris Johnson stuck by Mr Jenrick despite anger over his approval of media mogul Richard Desmond’s 1,500-home Westferry Printworks development in east London, which happened after they sat next to each other at a Tory function.

The permission came the day before a new council community levy would have cost Mr Desmond’s company an extra £40 million.

Mr Jenrick later had to quash his own approval, conceding the decision was ‘unlawful’ due to ‘apparent bias’.

There was also criticism over Mr Jenrick’s decision to travel 150 miles from his London property to his Herefordshire home – also 130 miles from his constituency –  and then journeying for more than an hour to visit his parents in Shropshire while the country was in Covid lockdown.

After it emerged he traveled from the capital to the country pad near Leominster – despite having a £2.5million flat near Parliament – he said it was his family’s main home. 

But his website at the time said he, Michal and their three daughters ‘live in Southwell near Newark, and in London’.

Parliamentary expenses records at the time show that he had claimed £100,000 in rent, council tax and travel expenses for Newark since being elected .

The role also saw him take on another thorny issue where a misstep can draw the ire of the Tory backbenches – planning reform.

With controversies mounting, and his popularity fraying with Tory MPs who objected to what they feared would be too much housebuilding in the wrong place, a reshuffle saw Mr Jenrick shown the door.

The arrival of Liz Truss in Number 10 saw him return to Government for a short stint in the Department of Health.

Then in October 2022, with Rishi Sunak taking the top job, Mr Jenrick was appointed immigration minister.

The role was never going to be an easy task, with many in the Tory party and beyond calling for the Government to reduce the number of people crossing the English Channel in small boats and while also reducing legal migration.

A commitment to ‘stop the boats’ was one of Mr Sunak’s five pledges at the start of year, putting Mr Jenrick’s brief right at the top of the Government’s priorities.

He made headlines by ordering the removal of Mickey Mouse artwork at an asylum centre for unaccompanied children.

Murals depicting cartoon characters were painted over at a Kent facility used to hold those who arrive in Britain after crossing the Channel in small boats.

Mr Jenrick was reported to have felt the murals gave the impression the UK was too ‘welcoming’ to migrants arriving from France after undertaking sea journeys.

But despite Mr Sunak’s stated commitment to do ‘everything it takes’ to make the Rwanda scheme operational, Mr Jenrick shocked Westminster by resigning and becoming one of the PM’s most strident backbench Tory critics.