Oops. Has Suella Braverman accidentally reignited war with the civil service? On Tuesday, after the Home Secretary announced the details of her new Illegal Migration Bill, a triumphant email from CCHQ landed in the inboxes of Tory party members.
‘We tried to stop the small boat crossings without changing our laws,’ it declared. ‘But an activist blob of left-wing lawyers, civil servants and the Labour party blocked us. So today we’re changing our laws – and bringing the small boat crossings to an end.’ The signature at the bottom of the email: Suella Braverman.
Unsurprisingly, the civil service didn’t take too kindly to being lumped into part of Suella’s ‘activist blob’. Dave Penman, general secretary of the civil service union the FDA, wrote a furious letter to Rishi Sunak complaining about Braverman’s email.
The email, he said, was ‘a direct attack on the integrity and impartiality of the thousands of civil servants who loyally serve the home secretary’.
Britain’s best politics newsletters
You get two free articles each week when you sign up to The Spectator’s emails.
Already a subscriber? Log in
Comments
Join the debate, free for a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first month free.
UNLOCK ACCESS Try a month freeAlready a subscriber? Log in