Braverman claims her makes an attempt to decrease authorized migration have been ‘blocked’
Suella Braverman has taken a fresh swipe at Rishi Sunak, claiming her attempts to lower legal migration were ‘blocked’.
The former home secretary, who is expected to stand in the Tory leadership race, said she ‘made the case’ but the then-prime minister did not agree with her.
It comes after Mr Sunak was said to have personally called all 175 colleagues who lost their seats last week to apologise.
Today Mrs Braverman told GB News that Mr Sunak had given her an assurance that he would ‘work with me to lower legal migration and cut the number of visas’.
But she said: ‘Unfortunately, I was blocked… I just wanted to deliver a manifesto commitment to lower overall migration.
Suella Braverman, who is expected to stand in the Tory leadership race, said she ‘made the case’ but the then-prime minister did not agree with her
It comes after Mr Sunak was said to have personally called all 175 colleagues who lost their seats last week to apologise
‘But if the Prime Minister doesn’t agree with you, if no one around the Cabinet table agrees with you, you’re not getting anywhere. And that is the reality that I came up against.
‘Could I have tried harder? I struggled. I struggled privately for 12 months, biting my lip, supporting the Prime Minister, trying to persuade from the inside. He didn’t agree with me.’
Mrs Braverman said she was ‘very concerned about the exponential rise in immigration’, and said she was the ‘only one around the Cabinet table who was moving, mobilised and motivated’ on legal migration figures.
Her comments will be seen as a swipe at her rivals for the likely Tory leadership.
But Mr Sunak, who remains Conservative party leader, now faces calls to remove her chances of winning the leadership contest by expelling her from the party following remarks she made about the LGBTQ+ flag earlier this week.
The Fareham MP branded the LGBTQ+ Progress Pride flag as ‘horrible’ and ‘monstrous’.
She hit out at ‘far, far too many Tory politicians’ who wanted the flag flown in Whitehall to show ‘how liberal and progressive we are’.
Mrs Braverman, moaned she was too enfeebled as a minister to get the flag removed from her own department.
She blamed ‘other Tory politicians’ for her failure, while also delivering a wider attack on ‘liberal Conservatives’ who ‘trashed’ the party.
‘The Progress flag says to me, one monstrous thing: That I was a member of a government that presided over the mutilation of children in our hospitals’, she said.
Suella Braverman was widely condemned after she branded the LGBTQ + Progress Pride flag as ‘horrible’ and ‘monstrous’
The former home secretary hit out at ‘far, far too many Tory politicians’ who wanted the flag flown in Whitehall to show ‘how liberal and progressive we are’
Mrs Braverman, who is expected to run for the Conservative leadership, moaned she was too enfeebled as a minister to get the Progress Pride flag removed from her own department
Despite a fierce backlash, Mrs Braverman doubled down on her comments with a post on social media
Mrs Braverman’s blistering speech in Washington DC on Tuesday stirred up a backlash within Conservative ranks, with some Tories vowing to thwart her leadership ambitions.
Casey Byrne, a former Conservative candidate for Reading Borough Council and LGBTQ+ campaigner, said Braverman should be ‘expelled’ for the comments.
Speaking to the BBC, he said: ‘Suella Braverman has crossed a very clear line that only her expulsion from the Conservative Party, would be an appropriate consequence.
‘Rishi Sunak, as leader, should expel her from the party and send a clear message – we will not tolerate hate.’
Johnny Luk, a former parliamentary Conservative candidate for Milton Keynes Central in Buckinghamshire, also condemned Ms Braverman’s speech.
MailOnline has contacted Mrs Braverman for comment.
Meanwhile, Mrs Braverman got into a public slanging match this week with her Tory leadership rival Kemi Badenoch.
Mrs Braverman tweeted that she would be ‘interested in knowing whether Kemi thinks I’m having a ‘very public nervous breakdown’, as Mrs Badenoch was reported to have said during a meeting of the shadow cabinet.
Mrs Badenoch said it was a ‘shame’ the discussions had been leaked, but did not deny making the nervous breakdown remark about Mrs Braverman.
Mrs Badenoch (pictured at the Spectator’s summer party) said it was a ‘shame’ the discussions had been leaked, but did not deny making the nervous breakdown remark about Mrs Braverman
In a post on X – formerly known as Twitter – Ms Badenoch did not deny her reported comments
Ms Braverman promptly ignored Ms Badenoch’s suggestion that arguments should be held in private as she publicly responded on the social media site yesterday
While the starting gun has yet to be fired on the leadership race, contenders have begun making their pitches privately.
Shadow communities secretary Mrs Badenoch has reportedly demanded her rivals sign a non-aggression pact to avoid blue-on-blue attacks.
Her team are said to be braced for a circular firing squad as part of a ‘Stop Kemi’ campaign, the Sun reported.
The timing of the contest remains unclear, but former chancellor George Osborne yesterday urged the party to take its time.
He said there was a ‘strong argument for allowing the Conservative Party conference to be the hustings for the conservative leadership and allow time for new candidates to emerge’.
And he said Mrs Badenoch needs to be ‘the leader not the warrior’.
‘She’s a kind of warrior, she likes taking the fight to people. I’ve had good, robust arguments with her but can she be the consolidator, the leader, the healer?,’ he told the Political Currency podcast.
‘Can she bring the party together? In some ways, she was right to tick off the shadow cabinet for being too complacent. I completely agree with her about that. I think she needs to make the move over the next few weeks to being the leader not the warrior.’
