Sunak’s team expects to win the British case, but, should they fail, pressure on the premier to withdraw will grow. The UK should “keep every option open,” Gove said Sunday, when asked about the convention. Gove supported Badenoch to be party leader last year…reports Asian Lite News
Dame Priti Patel took aim at Suella Braverman’s migration speech as she suggested the Home Secretary was attention-seeking.
In an address in the US last week, Braverman argued that multiculturalism had “failed” and called for international treaties such as the UN Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) should be reformed. But former home secretary Dame Priti said her successor may have been trying to “get attention”.
Speaking on Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips on Sky News, she said: “I don’t know what the intention was around that. It might just be to get attention, to have the dividing lines that previous commentators were mentioning as we go into the run-up to a general election.”
Dame Priti, who led the Home Office for three years under Boris Johnson, warned interventions such as speeches are “no substitute for action”. The senior Conservative MP insisted the public wants to see results on the pledge to stop small boats crossing the Channel.
She said: “This side of a general election, if I might politely suggest it is about delivery and the Government will be judged on delivery. When you make pledges, statements and promises, you have to deliver. But of course pledges are no substitute for action. I think the public, they are sick of hearing about some of these issues and the failure to deliver. I think it is right that everyone puts a shoulder to the wheel and cracks on and does the work.”
The ally of Johnson also took issue with Braverman’s comments about communities living separately. She told host Sir Trevor: “You and I are sitting here today, we are the products of actual integration, multiculturalism, dynamic communities, people who love our country, want to contribute to our country, along with a hell of a lot of other people that have done exactly the same.
Sunak faces cabinet split
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is under growing pressure from members of his Cabinet to take the UK out of the European Convention on Human Rights, a move that could open a dramatic rift in the government ahead of a general election expected next year.
On the first day of the governing Conservative Party’s annual conference in Manchester, Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove joined Business Secretary Kemi Badenooch in saying the UK’s membership of the ECHR, which some Tories blame for preventing the government from deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda, should be up for discussion. Home Secretary Suella Braverman is a long-time advocate of leaving the convention.
Sunak has made stopping small boats carrying asylum-seekers arriving from France a key priority he wants voters to measure him by. Deporting arrivals to Rwanda is a central part of that policy, but the Strasbourg court that oversees the ECHR has intervened to block the effort. Meanwhile, the British Supreme Court is also expected to rule by the end of the year on whether the plan is legal.
Sunak’s team expects to win the British case, but, should they fail, pressure on the premier to withdraw will grow. The UK should “keep every option open,” Gove said Sunday, when asked about the convention. Gove supported Badenoch to be party leader last year.
The issue is potentially seismic, given the UK was heavily involved in drafting and signed in 1951. Though not administered by the European Union, it has become a focal issue of Brexit supporters, who see it as enabling foreign control of Britain’s immigration policy. Pulling out would force Sunak to again counter charges that the UK is surrendering its leadership on the world stage.
In the ECHR’s seven-decade history, only two nations have abandoned it: Greece did during a period of military rule, but later rejoined. President Vladimir Putin’s Russia also quit the framework. The treaty’s basic principles cover things like free elections, respect for property rights and access to education.
“I don’t feel that in order to achieve what we need to achieve, to protect our borders, we are necessitated to leave the ECHR,” Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said.
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