Rishi Sunak Criticised For Reappointing "Careless And Slapdash" Suella Braverman After Security Breach
Suella Braverman has been appointed as Home Secretary (Alamy)
3 min read
Labour has called for clarity about the nature of the security breach that led to Suella Braverman’s resignation last week after she was reappointed to her previous role as home secretary in Rishi Sunak's new cabinet.
Braverman quit government on the penultimate day of Liz Truss’s premiership after admitting to sending official documents from her personal email address in what she described as a “technical infringement” of ministerial rules.
Former transport secretary Grant Shapps was appointed as her replacement, but remained in the role only six days after Rishi Sunak reappointed Braverman to her previous job after becoming Prime Minister on Tuesday.
In response to Braverman's appointment, despite the security breach, shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper raised a point of order in the Commons calling for the government to provide more information about the exact nature of Braverman’s breach.
“In the urgent question last week, I raised a series of questions whether there had been an official audit to check what official documents the former and current home secretary might have circulated from personal emails, because there are suggestions in the media that there have been others.
“And also whether the Right Honourable Member for Fareham resignation letter was in fact factually correct, because her account was different from briefings to the media and the Cabinet Office Minister's statement last week.”
“The Home Secretary has access to the most sensitive information of all relating to our national security. We cannot have someone careless and slapdash in that job.”
Cooper went on to criticise Sunak for bringing Braverman back into the Cabinet, despite promising in a speech outside Downing Street on Tuesday that his government would have “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”.
She continued: “How on earth does it meet standards of integrity and professionalism, to reappoint someone who's just broken the ministerial code? Just breached all Standards of professional behaviour in a great Office of State?”
“It just looks as if the new prime minister has put a party before country, and our national security and public safety are too important for this.”
The former shadow Home Secretary and veteran Labour MP Diane Abbott told PoliticsHome it was "very disappointing" to see Braverman reinstated.
"Looks like a deal was done at the last minute where she would be put back in her job in return for backing him," she added.
"She will cause him nothing but trouble, whether it is sabotaging a trade deal with India because she abuses Indian migrants, or refusing to allow more migrants generally although our economy is suffering from severe labour shortages."
Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the PCS union, also criticised the decision to reappoint Braverman. He said: "It beggars belief a minister who lost her job just days ago for breaching ministerial rules can be welcomed back into Government as if nothing happened.
"This back-to-the-future Government has the same old minister and the same old policies that will do nothing to inspire the confidence of our members."
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