Suella Braverman's letter to Rishi Sunak after being sacked as home secretary

It was expected Suella Braverman would have more to say following her dismissal Monday but in her letter to the PM , released today , she responds to her exit , and gives it to him with both barrels in her first shot.

Dear prime minister,

Thank you for your phone call yesterday morning in which you asked me to leave government. While disappointing, this is for the best.

It has been my privilege to serve as home secretary and deliver on what the British people have sent us to Westminster to do.

I want to thank all of those civil servants, police, Border Force officers and security professionals with whom I have worked and whose dedication to public safety is exemplary.

I am proud of what we achieved together: delivering on our manifesto pledge to recruit 20,000 new police officers and enacting new laws such as the Public Order Act 2023 and the National Security Act 2023. I also led a programme of reform: on anti-social behaviour, police dismissals and standards, reasonable lines of enquiry, grooming gangs, knife crime, non-crime hate incidents and rape and serious sexual offences.

And I am proud of the strategic changes that I was delivering to Prevent, Contest, serious organised crime and fraud. I am sure that this work will continue with the new ministerial team.

As you know, I accepted your offer to serve as home secretary in October 2022 on certain conditions.Despite you having been rejected by a majority of party members during the summer leadership contest and thus having no personal mandate to be prime minister, I agreed to support you because of the firm assurances you gave me on key policy priorities.
These were, among other things:

1. Reduce overall legal migration as set out in the 2019 manifesto through, inter alia, reforming the international students route and increasing salary thresholds on work visas;
2. Include specific 'notwithstanding clauses' into new legislation to stop the boats, i.e. exclude the operation of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), Human Rights Act (HRA) and other international law that had thus far obstructed progress on this issue;
3. Deliver the Northern Ireland Protocol and Retained EU Law Bills in their then existing form and timetable:
4. Issue unequivocal statutory guidance to schools that protects biological sex, safeguards single sex spaces, and empowers parents to know what is being taught to their children.

This was a document with clear terms to which you agreed in October 2022 during your second leadership campaign. I trusted you. It is generally agreed that my support was a pivotal factor in winning the leadership contest and thus enabling you to become prime minister.

For a year, as home secretary I have sent numerous letters to you on the key subjects contained in our agreement, made requests to discuss them with you and your team, and put forward proposals on how we might deliver these goals. I worked up the legal advice, policy detail and action to take on these issues. This was often met with equivocation, disregard and a lack of interest.

You have manifestly and repeatedly failed to deliver on every single one of these key policies. Either your distinctive style of government means you are incapable of doing so. Or, as I must surely conclude now, you never had any intention of keeping your promises.
These are not just pet interests of mine. They are what we promised the British people in our 2019 manifesto which led to a landslide victory. They are what people voted for in the 2016 Brexit referendum.

Our deal was no mere promise over dinner, to be discarded when convenient and denied when challenged. I was clear from day one that if you did not wish to leave the ECHR, the way to securely and swiftly deliver our Rwanda partnership would be to block off the ECHR, the HRA and any other obligations which inhibit our ability to remove those with no right to be in the UK. Our deal expressly referenced 'notwithstanding clauses' to that effect.

Your rejection of this path was not merely a betrayal of our agreement, but a betrayal of your promise to the nation that you would do "whatever it takes" to stop the boats.

At every stage of litigation I cautioned you and your team against assuming we would win. I repeatedly urged you to take legislative measures that would better secure us against the possibility of defeat.

You ignored these arguments. You opted instead for wishful thinking as a comfort blanket to avoid having to make hard choices. This irresponsibility has wasted time and left the country in an impossible position.
news.sky.com...

Hell hath no fury ....

It aint going to be pretty but it'll be fun , Tory civil war incoming.

a reply to: gortex


Its widely known that I have very, very little regard for our politicians.
But she has gone up in my estimation.

In a superbly written letter with lots of barbs and insights into Sunak's 'leadership' my favourite of many highlights was this little paragraph;

In October of last year you were given an opportunity to lead our country. It is a privilege to serve and one we should not take for granted. Service requires bravery and thinking of the common good.

It is not about occupying the office as an end in itself.

This tactic, prevalent on ATS. Was she telling the truth? YES. so why. Tactic "attack the messenger kill the message". Easy aint it.

We don't normally see this kind of letter in British politics, and I think there is a "political tradition" reason for that.

By convention, our government is collective, not personal. The voters don't elect a leader directly. They elect a group of people, who choose their own leader. This is because. conventionally, the entire Cabinet is responsible for what government does, having made the decisions jointly, and are therefore understood to agree with what the government does.

Once a minister decides that he disagrees with what the government is doing, his usual public option is to resign and make a resignation speech in the Commons explaining why he feels obliged to separate himself from the Cabinet. The classic recent example being Sir Geoffrey Howe. I watched that speech live, incidentally, being unemployed at the time, and I observed how Maggie listened to the entire speech with her head turned round in his direction with an expression of what looked like polite interest. Not, as portrayed in film, facing forwards and glowering.

I don't think dismissed ministers normally defend themselves in the polite exchange of letters published on these occasions. More commonly, they go as far as her first five paragraphs and then stop.

It seems to me that the paragraphs where she makes the counter-attack personal are a little at odds with the "collective responsibility" tradition.

Suella is making a speech in Parliament today. Will be intereting to see if she waves about the letters of agreement between her and Sunak.
I can't help but be reminded of the 'behind closed door' deal Blair and Brown made apparently.....
Also, given the High Court decision on Rwanda due today, things are about to get very interesting.
Given Suella's background in International Law she was well qualified as Foreign Secretary.
Rainbows
Jane

originally posted by: crayzeed
This tactic, prevalent on ATS. Was she telling the truth? YES. so why. Tactic "attack the messenger kill the message". Easy aint it.

If that's aimed at me I fail to see where in the few words I wrote did I attack anyone ?

Braverman is right in what she wrote but that doesn't absolve her of her wrongs , Online Safety Act , curtailing freedom of speech , anti protest laws and the pièce de résistance having a public argument with the Met police over our Right to Protest , all that in just 12 months.

A sceptical person might postulate that the latter was with the intent of forcing Sunak to fire her because she thinks his time has gone and hers is there for the taking , her letter was the first shot in a leadership campaign for her attempt to become leader.

I'm sure there is more to come.

a reply to: gortex
OOoo, steady on, a bit touchy. It was not aimed at you but quite a few on here that uses that tactic. What Braverman was sacked over was nothing that she said before, it what she said about the Met being biased when policing these new "protests" and when you look a some of the video evidence she is quite correct. I personally have been "near" a few protests and can equivocally tell you that bias happens virtually every time.
Just two scenarios for you 1. Stand back and let it happen. 2. Kettling.

a reply to: crayzeed

OOoo, steady on, a bit touchy. It was not aimed at you but quite a few on here that uses that tactic.

My apologies.

As she said in the letter Sunak has little support in the Parliamentary Conservative party even less now he's upset the Right getting rid of Braverman , with an election due some time next year and the party being 21 points behind an unpopular Labour party I think the Tories know they can't go into an election with Sunak in charge.

The thought of either of the Parties fills me with dread.

a reply to: gortex
I have been a Labour supporter all my life but Starmer and the party????????? I honestly don't know who i will vote for. I keep saying to my granddaughter "leave the country when you can" because we are well and truly fu#### and the only way I can see any changes happening IS with an armed uprising, which really we cannot do.

Sensing blood the Labour party turns on itself , big night in Parliament as so far 4 shadow ministers have resigned over the parties not calling for a ceasefire , a bigger blow to Starmer is the resignation of Jess Phillips !
news.sky.com...

a reply to: gortex
Could this be the unofficial decision of the next election? A pro-Israel coalition or a pro-Gaza coalition?

a reply to: DISRAELI2
That would involve 2 new parties. Given the division you cited.... it would be more like a civil war.
Rainbows
Jane

a reply to: angelchemuel
We're coming close to getting two new parties. The formation of a new government after a hung election could easily revolve around that issue,

originally posted by: gortex
.. with an election due some time next year and the party being 21 points behind an unpopular Labour party I think the Tories know they can't go into an election with Sunak in charge.

Unless, Tories are following usual pattern - spend 10+ years bending the country over and bleeding it dry, then making themselves unelectable with a useless leader that will bring about strategic voting to keep them out.

The Ghost of Christmas past has a new name , today it's been revealed its name is .... Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton.

During his time in office, the former Conservative leader was known as a member of the so-called "Chipping Norton set".

The group, featuring wealthy members of the British establishment who lived in the area, also included presenter Jeremy Clarkson and News UK chief executive Rebekah Brooks.
news.sky.com...

HaHa , see what they did there , those Tories.