British cabinet reshuffled: chaos days in London

After the British Prime Minister Truss had already replaced her finance minister, the home secretary also left. Chaos in Westminster, the cabinet shows signs of being released – and then there was an uproar in the lower house.

During Parliament’s question time at noon, Prime Minister Liz Truss hurled the slogan at the opposition’s calls for her resignation that she was a “fighter, not a slacker.”

Things seemed to have calmed down after Truss sparked financial chaos with planned tax breaks and had to make a 180-degree political turn with newly appointed Treasury Secretary Jeremy Hunt earlier in the week.

Interior Minister resigns

But then in the afternoon there was a new irritation: the sudden resignation of Interior Secretary Suella Braverman. In her letter of resignation, Braverman stated that she had sent government papers through a private email account, and she took responsibility for breaking the rules. She further wrote:

A jab at Truss, who had been criticized for not resigning herself over the tax plan fiasco but sacrificing her Treasury Secretary. In the second part of the letter, however, Bravermann openly shot at Truss: She was concerned about the government’s direction, important promises had been broken and the election program had been abandoned.

Braverman from the very right wing

Former Attorney General Suella Braverman is on the far right of the Conservative Party and advocates for a tougher crackdown on deportations. At the conservative party conference in early October, she raved that she dreamed of a cover photo on the conservative Daily Telegraph with the government’s first deportation flight to Rwanda.

In a debate this week about harsh penalties for public order infractions, such as traffic blockades by radical environmentalists, Braverman ranted that we were dealing with a “coalition of chaos, Guardian-readers, tofu-eating Wokerati.”

Ex-transport minister new interior minister

Behind the scenes, there is said to have been a dispute between Truss and Braverman about immigration. Truss needs outside labor for its growth program, which probably couldn’t be done with Braverman.

The Home Secretary was replaced by former Transport Secretary Grant Shapps. He had supported Truss’s rival Rishi Sunak in the election campaign for the office of prime minister. Shapps admitted at the photo op in front of the Home Office that the government is going through difficult times.

Riots when voting in the House of Commons

But the day wasn’t over yet. There was turmoil last night in the House of Commons over a vote on fracking rights. The motion by the opposition Labor Party was rejected by a large majority. But many Conservative MPs are said to have been extremely reluctant to vote against Labor’s proposal to introduce legislation to ban fracking. There were also quite a few abstentions.

The whips, who are responsible for group discipline, are said to have physically forced some colleagues into the corresponding voting room. Conservative MPs could not have voted freely and unhindered, Labor MP Chris Bryant said afterwards in the plenary:

Similar observations were also made on Twitter. Economy Minister Jacob Rees-Mogg contradicted these representations.

Confusion over alleged vote of confidence

Until shortly before the vote, it was unclear whether the conservative party saw it as a vote of confidence. In that case, members of parliament who do not adhere to group discipline should have expected a group expulsion.

Rumors circulated for hours after the vote that Chief Whip Wendy Morton and her deputy Craig Whittaker had resigned. Late in the evening, 10 Downing Street said the two were still in office.

“I’ve never experienced a day like this”

The spokesman for the House now wants to investigate the events surrounding the vote. Longtime Conservative MP Charles Walker then described his horror on the BBC:

“We’ve had a wild few days around Brexit but I’ve never seen a day like this. It’s inexcusable, a shame, appalling. I’m so angry at how this government is damaging our party, I’ve had enough.”

After a chaotic day in Westminster, the hours, not just the days, could be numbering for Liz Truss. The crux of the matter, however, is that the faction would have to have a plan for who should replace Truss and what procedure will be used to decide that. The call for early elections is getting louder. But with the Labor Party trailing more than 30 percent in opinion polls, that may not be an option for the Conservatives.