Suella Braverman must resign now

The home secretary has undermined the independence of the police and weaponised Remembrance commemorations for her own political ends. She must not be allowed to represent us at the Cenotaph on Sunday, writes former attorney general Dominic Grieve

Suella Braverman has sought to weaponise the Remembrance commemoration for her own purposes (PA Wire)

The home secretary, like her predecessors, bears a heavy responsibility. She is the minister within government with ultimate responsibility for our internal national security and, as importantly, for ensuring that our freedom and democracy are preserved. Central to these tenets is the right to freedom of expression under the law.

Because we are a free society, the enforcement of the law is rightly outside her powers. That rests with the police, who take an oath to uphold and enforce the law without fear or favour, and an independent prosecutorial service to bring prosecutions if there is evidence that the law has been broken. If laws need changing, it is for parliament to do so.

In the last few days, Suella Braverman has entirely departed from these principles.

She has openly put pressure on the police to ban a protest march that the police consider, on the intelligence available, can take place within the law, and has criticised the chief commissioner of the Metropolitan Police for not doing her bidding, thus seeking to undermine his independence. She has claimed that, in doing so, she is representing the views of the “silent majority”.

There is little way of telling what that “silent majority” might, in fact, be thinking. But it is, in any event, irrelevant to her duty, which includes overseeing the requirement, in a free country, that minorities who hold viewpoints with which others might profoundly disagree are allowed to express them within the law.

In the case of the planned march on Saturday, demands for a ceasefire in Gaza, and expressions of support for Palestinians suffering in that conflict, are entirely lawful – just as are demonstrations in support of Israel after the murderous and depraved acts to which it has been subjected.

Insofar as there may be elements present at the march who might wish to incite antisemitic hatred or support terrorist violence in breach of the law, the police have clearly concluded that they have the resources to address this. In view of the limited disorder and breaches of the law in the previous marches, this does not appear to be unreasonable.

In aid of her stance, Braverman has also remarked upon the inappropriateness of holding this demonstration on Armistice Day. Indeed, she has sought to weaponise the Remembrance commemoration for her purpose, so as to better denigrate those who might choose to march.

As someone whose father lost his own father, and both uncles, in the First World War, with another of my grandfathers badly wounded in it, I was brought up to see Remembrance Sunday as a very important event. Armistice Day itself has undoubtedly recovered significance since the 100th anniversary of the First World War, but, unless it coincides with Remembrance Sunday, it is not now the day of the most significant ceremonies.

There is no evidence that the demonstration planned for Saturday will interfere with Armistice Day remembrance at all. Nor is there any current tradition or practice of other, unrelated public events not being permitted to take place on this day. The Lord Mayor’s Show in the City of London is programmed to go ahead tomorrow.

The attempted weaponisation of these events shows Braverman not only to lack any understanding of her office, or of what freedom under law is about, but to be positively dangerous to the development of common good in our society.

She is inciting division herself, and not acting to calm and curb intemperance and excess, or to modify, by debate, opinions with which she may properly disagree. She has sought to create a false narrative that lawfully demonstrating in a march on Armistice Day, about the war in Gaza, is in itself incompatible with being British and part of the collective national remembrance of our war dead.

There is a considerable irony in her behaviour. Our country’s involvement in the First World War was based on the violation of Belgium’s neutrality by Germany in breach of its guarantee under international law – something Germany dismissed at the time as a “scrap of paper”. It was to honour that guarantee that we declared war. Yet when Braverman was attorney general, she was prepared to advance and validate an entirely untenable legal argument that the United Kingdom was entitled to do exactly the same in respect of breaking our international legal obligations in respect of the Northern Ireland protocol – a position that has done damage to our country’s reputation and standing.

Braverman’s current behaviour is not an isolated aberration. It is all of a piece with her previous conduct in ministerial office, which includes a catalogue of events ranging from breaches of the ministerial code to describing rough sleeping as a “lifestyle choice” – all of which demonstrate her unfitness for office.

On Sunday, the country’s leaders will assemble with our King to lead our tribute to those who have died for us so that we might enjoy our freedom under law. The home secretary, holding a great office of state, will be present to lay one of the wreaths. The best thing the prime minister can do for us is to ensure that there is a new home secretary, worthy of the office, to do this.

Dominic Grieve KC was attorney general between 2010 and 2014