A Racist Clown Car of a Career

What's the point of having power if you can't abuse it? An aim Suella Braverman could be accused of pursuing, if her attempt to get preferential treatment for dealing with her speeding penalty is anything to go by. Widely reported in the press and on all the politics shows, the already-disgraced Home Secretary attempted to arrange a one-on-one speeding course to get out of a fine and points on her licence. Quite why, we don't know. She cited security "concerns", but was the avoidance of political embarrassment a calculation? Or simply playing the big I am? My money is on the last one.

There is an abuse of power here. Braverman asked civil servants to engineer a more convenient "punishment", and they refused to do so. That is the established fact, and neither Therese Coffey nor Rishi Sunak were able to offer any defences. In what should be a straightforward resigning matter, instead Labour and the Liberal Democrats have called for an investigation by the government's ethics monitor. Because accusing Tory ministers of outright corruption is not the done thing, it seems.

As you might recall, Braverman has a bit of form when it comes to breaking rules governing ministerial behaviour. No sooner was she appointed Home Secretary during the Liz Truss interlude that she was found leaking confidential documents to her coterie of friendly backbenchers. On that occasion she resigned, only to have had her career resurrected six days later so she could peddle culture war rubbish on Sunak's behalf. And there is her appearance at the National Conservatism conference a week ago. Is showing up on a platform from which Sunak's briefcase Toryism, despite going along with the Nat-Cs' racism and authoritarianism, the actions of a loyal minister? Or for that matter, using the occasion to launch one's own leadership campaign to replace her soi disant boss after the inevitable defeat?

Commenting from Hiroshima, Sunak did not explicitly say he was backing Braverman, preferring to hide behind his not knowing a great deal about it. But if past behaviour is any indication, there won't be an investigation, let alone a sacking. And from the Prime Minister's point of view, this makes political sense. The Home Secretary is a useful lightning rod that attracts the opprobrium of the Tory party's sundry liberal and left opponents while managing to tell the shrinking base that the government is delivering on their "very real concerns". Simultaneously it puts distance between Sunak and Braverman's policies, even though he's been very upfront about them being his priorities. It's like he wants Britain's asylum policy to be as awful and as racist as possible, but it's a responsibility he's contracted out. A tricky if not impossible balancing act were it not for the twisted mediascape we're afflicted with. Sunak also wants to keep her close because despite her abuses, dictatorial inclinations, and open declaration of disloyalty she's not on the backbenches fomenting grievances and coalescing opposition. Not that she has much of a base anyway and, indeed, by employing her Sunak is affording her the opportunity to build one. But Sunak is not the sharpest knife in the drawer when it comes to knowing his party and the respective weights of the would-be contenders and potential and actual malcontents.

It's true we'd like to see the speedy exit of Braverman from the Home Office, followed by a screeching crash on the back benches but, unfortunately, we're going to have to put up with her hogging the political slow lane until the general election pile up. She's not going anywhere unless she uncharacteristically does the decent thing, pulls over to the hard shoulder, and abandons her racist clown car of a career.

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