suella throne

Can she do it?*


Suella Braverman has launched a bid to become leader of the Conservative Party and the next prime minister.

The Attorney General was the first Tory MP to made her pitch for the top job, revealing during an interview with Robert Peston on the eve of Boris Johnson's resignation that she would stand. Encouraging the beleaguered PM to quit, she said she wouldn't be resigning from his government herself and that, in fact, she planned to take it over.

"If there is a leadership contest, I will put my name into the ring. I love this country. My parents came here with absolutely nothing and it was Britain that gave them hope, security and opportunity and afforded me incredible opportunities in education and my career", Braverman said.

"I owe a debt of gratitude to this country and to serve as Prime Minister would be the greatest honour so yes, I will try."

But, she said, "We’re in a crisis and I have statutory legal and constitutional duties...I don’t want to resign because I have that duty. We need an attorney in government".

Braverman's counterpart, shadow attorney general Emily Thornberry, mocked her bid in the House of Commons. "Can I say what an honour it is to be at this despatch box facing the next prime minister as she waits her call from the palace. A true honour", said the Labour MP.

Braverman replied that Thornberry "loves to degrade this questions session to petty politics", but that "I’m not going to lower myself to her standards".

After studying law at Cambridge University and completing her pupillage, Braverman joined No5 Chambers in London before entering politics in 2005. She became an MP in 2015 and has served as Johnson's Attorney General since 2020.

As the chief legal adviser to the Crown, the barrister weathered criticism from lawyers for her performance. In 2020, she was accused of sidelining legal advisors and breaching the ministerial code over her willingness to "disapply" parts of the Brexit deal with the EU, which many concluded would breach international law.

Labour welcomed the news of her bid, with MP Jess Phillips tweeting, "I can think of few people I'd rather stand against in an election than Suella Braverman. Best of luck to her".

Some posters on the RollOnFriday Discussion Board were sceptical of her chances. "Suella saying she'd run was like seeing someone's nan say they're interested in becoming an MMA fighter", said one. Legal commentator Joshua Rozenberg was less caustic, stating, "I wish Suella Braverman well in her ambition to become prime minister. What I do not think she can do in the meantime is remain attorney general".

Others surmised that she was angling for a top Cabinet job, and that Braverman and other early contenders were "simply using a potential leadership bid in order to position themselves as 'heavyweights', boosting their profile when it comes to ministerial appointments. The alternative just doesn't bear thinking about".

*Update 14 July 2022: No.

Tip Off ROF

Comments

Anonymous 08 July 22 08:42

I was SOOO impressed with Peston not cracking up with laughter as she said this.

I mean seriously!!!!! I wouldn't trust instructing her with a planning dispute. 

She is a genuine third rate intellect with no integrity.

Sensible 08 July 22 09:09

It’s the equivalent of listening to a trainee harp on about their partnership aspirations, as you watch them incorrectly photocopy a bundle.

Anonymous 08 July 22 09:12

"After studying law at Cambridge University and completing her pupillage, Braverman joined No5 Chambers in London before entering politics in 2005. She became an MP in 2015 and has served as Johnson's Attorney General since 2020."

After achieving more than most of the plodding associates commenting on this thread, Suella will now be accused being 'stupid' and 'useless' by people who Cambridge declined to allow through the door and whose pupillage dreams ended at the online application platform.

A hope in hell of being PM? Nope. And quite right too. But everyone calling her an imbecile should recognise that they're just engaging in onanism to make themselves feel better about their own lives.

Anonymous 08 July 22 09:20

I did not go to Cambridge, and that still stings a little.  However, for every day of my adult life I have been able to take comfort, reassurance and a degree of pride from the knowledge that I am not, and never will be a Tory minister.

Anonymous 08 July 22 09:22

Her lack of self awareness is truly breathtaking. 
 

But to be honest with our managing partner, and his performance at our recent overseas strategic planning weekend and in various partner and heads of department meetings, I’m used to it.
 

The problem with narcissists is that they are so wrapped up in their delusions they really can’t see how little respect their colleagues and other people have for them. 

Shambolic 08 July 22 09:32

The AG that was part of the government that routinely attacked lawyers. The AG who said schools did not have to accomodate children's gender wishes. The AG whose government's attacks on lawyers has led to a dramatic fall in successful high court challenges to government policy. The AG who did not support a windfall tax on energy companies. The AG who has covered Boris's law breaking back, when he tore up an international treaty he had promised to honour in the NI protocol. The AG who it was reported only in December 21 was supporting plans to let ministers throw out legal rulings they did not like. The AG who stood to gain the most from six month mat leave for MP's with a rushed vote in time for her impending mat leave. The AG who called a fellow female MP 'emotional' during a Brexit bill row, playing into female tropes. The AG who presided over her government being happy to break the law in a speicific and limited way and did not realise a crime is still a crime. The AG who did not think her defence of Dominic Cummings could have interfered with a potential legal process after she defended him, undermining the supposed independence of her office. 

I could go on.

Do we REALLY want this AG to be our next PM?

What a joke.

Niave person 08 July 22 09:49

I am probably niaive but I do wonder how "thick" you can be if you went to Cambridge and got a pupillage. She must have something about her, surely. I realise that this may be the most niaive thing anyone has ever written and I am almost already regretting posting this message even as I type it. 

BasicCivility 08 July 22 10:12

Watch the eye contact in the clip. You've got to be more confident than that if you're going to run for PM.

Anonymous 08 July 22 10:41

Anonymous 08 July 22 08:42:

This is a horrendeous smear on planning disputes - they can be both intellectually and legally challenging - and a great deal of fun! 

On behalf of planning lawyers everywhere, I am offended!

🤣

Anonymous 08 July 22 11:04

Shock news! Just because you went to Oxbridge does not mean you are super bright.

Some are super bright, but some are pretty average.

To be clear I am not accusing Suella of being thick - just pretty average. Good for a conveyancing dispute. No where close to the standard of intellect and integrity needed to be AG (let alone PM).

Anonymous 08 July 22 11:13

The civil servants who work with her despair. She is either absent or counter-productive and they actually prefer her to be absent.

Anonymous 08 July 22 11:28

@Niave person I used to think that too. You can be thick and go to Cambridge, it is v common. There are a lot of smart and talented people that go through Cambridge, there are also many stupid people. The stupid Cambridge grad is easy to spot – a lack of intellectual curiosity, poor critical thinking, zero commercial understanding, absolutely no self-awareness, they believe that anyone who went to Cambridge is special (they have to believe this as they peaked at 21) and without being asked they will tell you they went through Cambridge. Basically Anon @09.12.

Anonymous 08 July 22 11:43

ok cambridge fine, but her legal career was mediocre at best - same as Raab trying to hold out he was a top lawyer - a couple of years at Links a legal giant does not make. 

Live from GLD 08 July 22 11:59

She is not well thought of by any government lawyers I have spoken to (which is quite a few). I can also confirm that government lawyers were openly celebrating yesterday's events in the office and drawing comparisons to Hitler's final days in the Fuhrerbunker

Anon 08 July 22 12:01

Oxbridge graduates are by definition the intellectual cream of their generation. On any view, therefore, Suella is very clever. But that is not enough to be PM, as Boris amply demonstrated.

Anonymous 08 July 22 12:33

Agreed. Oxbridge grads are the cream. 52% of the government is made up of them. Look how well we are doing 😬

Anonymous 08 July 22 13:41

Can we just get on with the class war already. Bugsy I get to eat Anon at 12:01, I love the taste of privilege and delusion. 

Anonymous 08 July 22 14:59

Going to Oxbridge as an undergraduate means you did very well on your exams when you were 17 or 18.

 

That's it.

Anonymous 08 July 22 16:37

"The stupid Cambridge grad is easy to spot – a lack of intellectual curiosity, poor critical thinking, zero commercial understanding, absolutely no self-awareness, they believe that anyone who went to Cambridge is special (they have to believe this as they peaked at 21) and without being asked they will tell you they went through Cambridge."

Almost as easy to spot as the chap who remains bitter about their rejection letter twenty years later...

 

Anonymous 08 July 22 17:08

"I can also confirm that government lawyers were openly celebrating yesterday's events in the office and drawing comparisons to Hitler's final days in the Fuhrerbunker"

These sound like reasonable and balanced views from people who are not blinded by their own partisan biases and who have formed them based on a rational and objective reading of the evidence, which we should all take very seriously indeed.

SecularJurist 08 July 22 19:46

What shambolic said.

Totally unfit to be AG, let alone PM. But this is England, and standards are pretty low since it voted 'Leave', or revealed the mediocrity under the facade of being a leading nation.

SecularJurist 08 July 22 19:49

Her 'debt of gratitude' would be to STFU, FTFO and go into conveyancing in a provincial town that people pass by on the way to Saunthorpe.

Anon 08 July 22 20:43

I worked for BLM llp (rip). I’m not sure I would allow lawyers to run anything. 
I’m told 45 colleagues and partners walked out on Clyde Day, the 1st July. 
ROF, is any of that true? 

Toby Greenlord, Freeman on the Land 09 July 22 13:52

I expect it's a spelling mistake.

They probably mean Zoella.

Hackaforte 09 July 22 14:03

Her attachment to the term ‘cultural Marxism’ suggests that her term as PM (heaven help us) would be fuelled by conspiracy theories and manufactured outrage.

Toby Greenlord, Freeman on the Land 09 July 22 14:45

I'd be happy to face her in a television licence case in any town in any country in the UK.

I'll take her on and take her down.

And afterwards I'll screw up the court papers, throw them in the recycling and eat tofu for my dinner.

And not have a single regret.

You're nothing Braverperson.  You hear me?

NOTHING!

Anonymous 13 July 22 14:07

She isn't an anything really.

(1) Got a 2:1 at Cambridge, went to a lower tier set doing criminal and public law work and wasn't kept on. Being kept on is the first real world test of how good you are.

(2) Then went to another tier regional set doing criminal and public law, and wasn't successful; so stayed 2 years and went into government where she would have been paid the equivalent of 30-45k in today's money.

(3) 5 years later she got an MP role, then got a promotion to AG in a reshuffle. Not sure how competitive this game is, but seems to me they have to appoint a lawyer who is an MP to be AG. Anyway she earns as AG about £113k which is about the same as an NQ at Bakers but without the skill and intelligence of one. Because at least an NQ at Bakers has been kept on after 2 years.

(4) Legitimately her "claim to fame" is going to Cambridge. There's a back and forth about this in the comments, but whatever position you take, this is what she peddles. She has a 1 minute elevator pitch - which she runs out in every interview - and is the cornerstone of her own website, which goes a little like:

"I came from nothing, no money, immigrant parents, private school, but was so brilliant I got a scholarship (which wouldn't have paid all of the fees, but nevermind), went to Cambridge - Cambridge University, not just the town. Actually, whether you construe Cambridge as a town or a city, I went there. Having come from nothing. Like black hole. Pre-big bang. Nothing. And I studied at the university too. Cambridge University. Otherwise known as the University of Cambridge. A university for the smartest people who can smart. I smarted there. And we need the smartest people to run our country. And now I'm here ready to serve and give me enormous gigantic, immigrant brain back to this country."

(5) Will give her credit for scarcely mentioning the lawyer thing in her spiel - she has at least an iota of self-awareness to realise that this will not give her brownie points with the general public.

Anonymous 14 July 22 09:29

Choosing between this set of tory candidates if like choosing which toilet to use at Glastonbury.

Anonymous 14 July 22 15:44

Zoella is out.

Saddest thing about all this is the middle-aged male solicitors knocking one out to Penny Mordaunt.

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