One of the few good decisions that the short-lived Prime Minister Liz Truss made was to force the resignation of Suella Braverman after a leak of official Home Office documents. How disappointing, then, for incoming PM Rishi Sunak to overturn that decision in less than a week. But the controversy about the initial incident and surrounding events has not gone away.
Recent events reminded me of the phrase, originally attributed to the late John Reid in 2006, that the Home Office was “not fit for purpose.” I have previously written about the ‘hostile environment’ fostered by Theresa May and increased under Priti Patel. Unbelievably, things have only got worse during Braverman’s short incumbency.
Rwanda – a chilling dream
It was hard to envisage a less humane Home Secretary than Priti Patel – that is, until Suella Braverman. In a speech at the Conservative Party conference, she made this chilling statement: “I would love to have a front page of The Telegraph with a plane taking off to Rwanda, that’s my dream, it’s my obsession.” What a horrendous and inhumane parallel to Martin Luther King’s famous speech for peace and freedom in 1963.
Braverman has fiercely lambasted those opposed to the contentious Rwanda scheme. Critics include numerous refugee charities, the Archbishop of Canterbury, House of Lords International Agreements Committee and King Charles himself, who reportedly condemned it as “appalling” when he was Prince – quite a list of the great and the good for Braverman to take on.
In June, the first flight due to take refugees to Rwanda was grounded at the eleventh hour after an injunction by the European Court of Human Rights. The plans are now subject to a number of legal challenges which are currently being considered by the High Court. These range from the general challenge about whether Rwanda is a safe place to send refugees, to the lawfulness of individual immigration decisions.
Until the High Court decision, no Rwanda flights will take place, despite Braverman’s ‘dream’ and her continuing commitment to the scheme. The recent decision by Privilege Style airlines to pull out of the Rwanda flights will create further delays.
Questions remain about email leaks
When Braverman originally resigned from the Truss government, she claimed that she had responded “rapidly” after realising that she had mistakenly emailed a document to a colleague. However, her latest account of the events, detailed in a letter to the Home Affairs select committee, appears to contradict the initial claim: she emailed the document at 7.25 am but only reported it after midday when it had already come to light. Her letter also admits sending official documents to her personal email six times.
Another important question is how sensitive was the document she leaked? According to the BBC, it was: “a draft written ministerial statement related to immigration visas containing highly sensitive information about government policy”, which certainly sounds ‘market sensitive’, but this has subsequently been denied.
Braverman‘s reappointment has caused a fierce backlash on both sides of the House. Former Conservative Party chair Sir Jake Berry accused her of “multiple breaches of the ministerial code.” Shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has been asking serious questions about Braverman’s “reckless reappointment” and Sunak’s serious “error of judgement” in doing so. Critics, including Brighton MP Caroline Lucas, have called for a full investigation, and Labour has already reported her to the financial watchdog.
Braverman faced questions from both sides of the House. Photo credit: UK Parliament, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Dire conditions at Manston migration centre
The latest accusations against Braverman concern the reportedly “wretched conditions” at Manston migration centre in Kent. Local Tory MP Sir Roger Gale said the situation at Manston was a “breach of humane conditions”: the centre, designed for 1,000 people, has been holding more than 4,000, with families sleeping on mats and cases of diphtheria rising. This number was further increased following the fire-bomb attack at the migration centre in Dover.
The Times reported that Braverman was detaining asylum seekers at Manston for “unlawfully long periods”, despite warnings about overcrowding there, rather than rehousing them in alternative accommodation while their claims were considered. Answering questions in Parliament, she insisted that she did not ignore advice to reduce pressure at Manston or block emergency accommodation, simply repeating that the asylum system was “broken” – rather a poor excuse after 12 years of Tory rule.
Hundreds of refugees have now been moved from Manston – though some seem to have just been left stranded in central London – and considerable concerns remain about the huge backlog in processing asylum claims. Campaign group Detention Action are threatening a judicial review over conditions at the centre.
Inflammatory language
Addressing serious concerns in the Commons on 31 October, Braverman talked about the “scourge” of illegal immigration and controversially described small boats crossing the Channel as, “an invasion of our southern coast.” These comments were called “indefensible” by refugee charity Care4Calais, while migration specialist Prof Tanya Bueltmann responded:
“Utterly despicable for Braverman to use the language of the far right and speak of an ‘invasion’. To choose this kind of inflammatory language a day after the attack on the Dover migrant centre makes it even worse. This is dangerous and unhinged.”
Global unrest is increasing the number of desperate people seeking refuge in the UK and elsewhere in Europe. However, Braverman’s claims are refuted by migration experts. The UK receives far fewer asylum applications than Germany or France and grants asylum to a far lower number, ranking 18th (per capita) among EU+ countries, according to the Migration Observatory’s latest figures. That’s without mentioning the more than seven million Ukrainians who’ve fled to Poland since the war began. So to call the numbers fleeing to the UK “an invasion” is, as Bueltmann argues, provocative and inflammatory.
As Enver Solomon from the Refugee Council writes:
“The new prime minister and immigration minister have a simple choice. To quickly change direction and demonstrate a far more compassionate approach, or to perpetuate the ongoing systemic failure and heartless response that has been of the government’s own choosing.”
The UK was one of the signatories to the 1951 Refugee Convention. With Braverman as Home Secretary, can we still be called a humane society?
