Suella Braverman "will be forgotten", former Tory leader Lord Howard said on Wednesday after the sacked Home Secretary delivered a scathing attack on Rishi Sunak's leadership.
Lord Howard, who also served as home secretary in the 1990s, accused Ms Braverman of being motivated by “personal ambition and a sense of pique”, insisting she could have resigned if she felt so strongly about the PM's alleged failures.
"I don't think the party is turning on itself again," he told BBC Radio 4's Today programme, adding: "I think that Suella Braverman will be forgotten."
Ms Braverman's fellow Brexiteer Philip Davies accused of staging a "hissy fit” with her letter of resignation. “I don't think it does her any credit at all and I say that as somebody who likes Suella, and who agrees with virtually everything. But this is not a very edifying letter to send," the Conservative MP told GB News.
“All I would say is if Suella felt so strongly about all of these things, why didn’t she resign and send this letter. She was there clinging on to her job and this is now somebody who's basically bitter because she has been sacked."
A ministerial ally of Mr Sunak also rejected Ms Braverman’s “very personal” letter of resignation as he insisted the Prime Minister was getting on with the job following his dramatic reshuffle on Monday.
Exchequer Secretary Gareth Davies said “I don't recognise” the sacked Home Secretary’s incendiary charges levelled at Mr Sunak in her letter.
“It is up to him who sits around his Cabinet table. He has just made a decision as to who sits around his Cabinet table. It's drawing on the strengths of all the party,” Mr Davies told Sky News.
“That is a letter very personal to her,” he said.
“I don't recognise the characterisations that she's outlined. I know the Prime Minister is one the hardest working people I've ever met, and he's continuing to act for the British people, not least with the inflation figures out today.”
Mr Sunak was facing his first Prime Minister’s Questions since Monday’s Cabinet reshuffle, less than 24 hours after Ms Braverman accused him of being “uncertain” and “weak” in her parting broadside.
The reshuffle saw her ousted and former prime minister David Cameron brought back as Foreign Secretary, with Mr Sunak hailing a new “strong and united team” in Government.
Mr Sunak had already been facing anger from the right of the Tory party, with Miriam Cates and Danny Kruger, who chair the “New Conservatives” group of MPs, suggesting he had abandoned issues important to Red Wall voters.
Mrs Braverman – whose leadership ambitions are no secret – issued a rallying cry to the party’s right with a call for an “authentic conservative agenda”.
She accused Mr Sunak of using “wishful thinking as a comfort blanket” rather than coming up with a back-up plan if his Rwanda scheme is blocked by the Supreme Court judgment later on Wednesday.
