Call the US jaunt a win-win for Suella Braverman. Trying to get the rest of the world to ditch its obligations to the 1951 UN refugee convention was always a long shot, but there was the off chance that UK voters would be confused enough to imagine the home secretary was on top of the small boats chaos. More to the point, Braverman got to imitate a global player ahead of this weekend’s Conservative party conference.
No bad thing, when there might be a vacancy for a new leader within a year or so. There’s nothing the Tory right love more than someone who bounces around their own echo chamber. And here was Suella out-Kemiing Kemi. Imagining she was saying the things that cannot be said, when really all she was doing was cynically stoking a culture war. Not to mention blaming her own failures on international agreements. No matter. Braverman will say anything, do anything, to secure the Tory leadership. Though if Suella is the answer, the Tories should urgently ask themselves what exactly the question is.
It’s sometimes hard to know why Braverman is still in her job. After all, it’s not as if she’s made a success of being home secretary. One of Rishi Sunak’s five promises was to stop the boats this year and she’s failed spectacularly at that. Worse, the backlog for processing asylum claims is growing with the hotel bill for applicants now £8m a day. Under normal circumstances that might make her vulnerable to the sack, but Suella is armour plated. No one cares that she’s actually not very capable or even very bright – becoming a lawyer must be easier than it looks. All that seems to count is that she is the darling of the right.
Whether anyone in the US was actually listening to the home secretary – almost certainly not – was immaterial. This was an overseas speech given at the centre-right American Enterprise Institute aimed almost exclusively at a home audience. Braverman didn’t waste any time with introductions, cutting to the chase immediately. The greatest threat to the planet was uncontrolled and illegal migration. I could have sworn that poverty and the climate crisis might be up there as greater threats. Then, what do I know. We must all bow before the weight of Suella’s intellect.
Braverman went on to quote a whole load of statistics. Only one of which was sourced. To Nick Timothy, Theresa May’s former adviser. It would be no surprise if all the numbers later turned out to be complete bollocks. Then anyone who dares question her has been duped by the global consensus.
Anyway, here was the deal. There were 900 million migrants on the loose and they were all headed for the UK in the largest ever convoy of small boats. And almost all of the 900 million were heading to Leicester where they were out to cause trouble. As far as anyone in the Home Office knows, Suella has never been to Leicester and knows nothing about it. But for some reason she’s got it in for the city.
There was then a brief acknowledgment of her own immigrant status. It was because her parents were immigrants that she knew how untrustworthy most immigrants were. Her parents had made an effort to assimilate British values. They had understood the importance of mutual respect and tolerance. But for some reason they had forgotten to pass those on to her. So she knew of what she spoke. Multiculturalism had failed. Even though the home secretary and the prime minister have Asian heritage. There were too many foreigners who had no interest in any culture other than their own. More importantly, the country was full. She had no idea that many European countries took far more asylum seekers than we did.
This led on to her solution. Get rid of the refugee convention. It was outdated. Past its sell-by date. Far too soft. We’d all been far too nice to people fleeing persecution. Now we were granting asylum to anyone who was feeling a wee bit uncomfortable in their homelands. Now, she had nothing against gay people or women. But really, it was about time they all toughened up a bit. If you can’t take a bit of discrimination and the odd death sentence then you’re not going to survive a moment in the modern world.
Then there was the European convention on human rights. Just open to abuse from lefty lawyers trying to make sure the law was upheld. There was nothing wrong with sending asylum seekers to Rwanda. So the ECHR had to go. There was nothing wrong in aligning with Russia and Belarus.
The only thing stopping most countries leaving these international conventions was that their leaders had been captured by the wokerati. They were too worried about being thought to be racists and bigots. People should just throw off their shackles and embrace their inner racist and bigot. It didn’t seem to have crossed Suella’s mind that the reason other countries weren’t keen to trash global treaties was that they weren’t racist or bigoted. Then, not a lot crosses her mind these days. She has very limited bandwidth.
What was needed was a new definition of refugee status. Preferably one that insisted anyone claiming to be a refugee was automatically lying and therefore could not be considered to be a refugee. As far as Braverman was concerned, this meant anyone coming from France could not be a refugee and therefore could be legally drowned. She wouldn’t rest until there were no asylum seekers left in the country.
That was it. Braverman smirked. It wasn’t clear whether she had just been freelancing or this was all now government policy. And Sunak was far too weak to tell us. So in 30 minutes, the home secretary had in effect trashed the UK’s human rights record for the past 70 years. Willing us to become a pariah state. She must be so proud. As must we.
Depraved New World by John Crace (Guardian Faber, £16.99). To support the Guardian and Observer, pre-order your copy at guardianbookshop.com. Delivery charges may apply.