This is the shock announcement from the government formed on Tuesday, October 25 by the new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak: the appointment of Suella Braverman to the Interior Ministry. The young woman has many points in common with the new head of government. Like him, she is 42 years old, is of Indian origin. A mother of two children, she entered the House of Commons in 2015.
Supporter of the deportations of migrants in Rwanda
Suella Braverman shares with him the goal of “regain control of national borders” and to drastically reduce immigration. She finds a ministry she left on October 19, a day before the official resignation of Liz Truss. Like Priti Patel who had preceded her, she promised to follow the same policy of deporting asylum seekers who arrived on British soil without a visa.
At the Tory Congress on October 4, she left more than one Conservative dumbfounded when she exclaimed that ” his dream “and even his « obsession »was that « the Daily Telegraph (British right-wing newspaper) devotes its front page to the photograph of a plane taking off for Rwanda ».
Opponent to Liz Truss
The day before the forced departure of Liz Truss, Suella Braverman left her post by admitting having sent by mistake, from her mailbox to a parliamentary assistant, documents indicating her refusal to follow the policy of a prime minister wishing to increase the immigration and provide expedited access to visas for workers in several industries.
In it, she did not mince words against her former boss: “I have serious concerns about the will of this government to honor the commitments of the program with which it was elected, such as reducing the total number of migrants and stopping illegal immigration, in particular dangerous crossings in small boats. »
Radical on Brexit
Radical on immigration, Suella Braverman was also radical on Brexit. A year after her arrival in the Commons, she was appointed president of the European Research Group (ERG), bringing together the most Eurosceptic deputies. An express promotion for this former student of the Erasmus university exchange program, who lived two years in Paris in the early 2000s.
She is also a regular at resignations. In November 2018, she also left her post as deputy minister in charge of leaving the European Union in the government of Theresa May, because she considered that the content of the Brexit agreement negotiated then was « a betrayal » Brexit voters. Four years later, she is the flag bearer of the extreme right of her party. How long until she quits?