Braverman Avoids Ethics Probe as Sunak Says She Didn’t Break Ministerial Code

Kitty Donaldson
·3 min read
1
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

(Bloomberg) -- Rishi Sunak will not refer Home Secretary Suella Braverman to an ethics probe over her handling of a speeding ticket last year, as he battles to contain deep divisions in his governing Conservative Party.

Most Read from Bloomberg

The prime minister took days to decide whether to order an inquiry, after the Sunday Times reported Braverman asked civil servants to help prevent her speeding violation becoming public. In a letter published Wednesday, Sunak said he accepted the home secretary’s version of events and along with the advice of his ethics adviser, concluded she had not broken ministerial rules.

But he also told her: “A better course of action could have been taken to avoid giving rise to the perception of impropriety.”

The furore surrounding Braverman reflects broader tensions in Sunak’s party. Her opponents criticize her political judgment — she was fired by Sunak’s predecessor, Liz Truss, over a security breach — and object to her hardline stance on immigration. Yet it is her megaphone brand of politics that appeals to the Tory right, the group that poses the greatest danger to the prime minister.

Read More: UK Speeding-Ticket Row Shows Sunak’s Hard Road to Election Day

Her speech last week attacking the government’s own performance on bringing down net migration, despite her own responsibility for immigration policy as home secretary, was widely interpreted as her pitch to be party leader.

The Tories trail the opposition Labour Party by a double-digit margin in most opinion polls, leading to expectations Sunak will be forced to stand down after losing the next general election.

Sunak’s decision not to investigate Braverman will please her supporters, as well as those in the party who accuse the civil service of political motivated attacks on right-wing ministers — especially if they supported Brexit. That narrative has gathered steam after Sunak’s No. 2, Dominic Raab, resigned over an inquiry that found he had intimidated his officials.

Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson frequently accuses the civil service of playing a part in his own downfall. His comment that he is victim of a “politically motivated stitch up” is running on several newspaper front pages on Wednesday, after he faced further allegations of pandemic rule-breaking.

That forms the backdrop to Sunak’s deliberations about Braverman, a minister to whom his premiership will always be inextricably linked. When Truss’s administration imploded, it was Braverman’s unexpected backing for Sunak that effectively ended Johnson’s own bid for an unlikely comeback.

The problem for the prime minister is that some Tories, especially in districts where the centrist Liberal Democrats are gaining ground, see Braverman as an electoral liability, and want Sunak to cut her lose.

Read More: Record UK Migration Surge Set to Expose Government Divisions

That tension will endure long after any fallout from Sunak’s decision about Braverman subsides, especially as immigration data due to be published Thursday is expected to show arrivals in the UK soared to a record last year.

Braverman also shows no sign of dropping her combative approach. In her own letter to Sunak, she denied instructing officials to go against the advice they gave her regarding the speeding ticket.

But in a testy session of Parliament on Monday, she refused to answer that question, instead repeating her rehearsed lines. The effect was to prolong the row, and heighten tensions on both sides.

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

©2023 Bloomberg L.P.