Badenoch insists she had US medical school offer

Kemi Badenoch has insisted she was offered a place to study medicine at Stanford University but said she does not now have the relevant papers, after a report cast doubt on the claim.

- POL ALLINGHAM Press Association

The Conservative Party leader previously said that at the age of 16 she was offered a place and partial scholarship to study medicine, sometimes describing it as premed, at the highly competitive California university.

Offers are made only to applicants with a bachelor’s degree, or an international equivalent, and there is no premed degree, according to the university's website.

The Conservatives were asked for clarification and said Mrs Badenoch had not applied but was offered a place by multiple US universities, including Stanford, on the basis of good exam results in US standardised tests, the Guardian reported on Sunday.

A Stanford admissions officer at the time of her application told the Guardian that he had not offered Mrs Badenoch a place and would have remembered if he had done so.

Jon Reider, then responsible for admitting international students and the allocation of bursaries, told the newspaper: “Although 30 years have passed, I would definitely remember if we had admitted a Nigerian student with any financial aid. The answer is that we did not do so.