Former Home Secretary Suella Braverman has become the latest Conservative MP to defect to Reform UK.
The Tory MP announced on Monday (January 26) she would be leaving the party after 30 years as a member, defecting to Nigel Farage’s party.
She becomes the third sitting Tory MP to join Reform UK this month, following Robert Jenrick and Andrew Rosindell.
There are now eight Reform UK MPs in the Commons.
Responding to Braverman’s defection on Monday afternoon, Labour chair Anna Turley said it confirmed that Farage is “stuffing his party full of failed Tories”.
Speaking at the Reform UK rally, Ms Braverman reiterated the “Britain is broken” claim used by Mr Jenrick in his defection speech earlier this month.
“When a country gives you everything, like it has done me, you owe it loyalty. And loyalty demands honesty,” she told the audience.
“And honesty compels me to say this today Britain is indeed broken. She is suffering. She is not well.
“Immigration is out of control. Our public services are on their knees. People don’t feel safe. Our youngsters are leaving the country for better futures elsewhere. We can’t even defend ourselves and our nation stands weak and humiliated on the world stage.
“So we stand at a crossroads. We can either continue down this route of managed decline to weakness and surrender. Or we can fix our country, reclaim our power, rediscover our strength. I believe that a better Britain is possible.”
Ms Braverman was once a leading figure in the Conservative Party, having served as attorney general under Boris Johnson and home secretary during Liz Truss’s brief premiership in September 2022.
But who is Suella Braverman and what are her views?
Who is Suella Braverman?
Suella Braverman, 42, was born Sue-Ellen Fernandes, to parents Christie and Uma Fernandes, who are from Kenya and Mauritius. They emigrated to the UK in the 1960s and Ms Braverman was born in Harrow.
Before the Tory leadership contest in the summer of 2024, Ms Braverman told ITV: “I love this country, my parents came here with absolutely nothing and it was Britain that gave them hope, security, and opportunity. This country has afforded me incredible opportunities in education and in my career.
“I owe a debt of gratitude to this country and to serve as PM would be the greatest honour, so yes, I will try.”
She attended Heathfield School in London before studying law at Queens’ College, Cambridge. She later gained a Master’s degree in law from the University of Paris 1, Pantheon-Sorbonne, and then qualified as a New York attorney.
She specialised in public law and judicial review. She has also defended the Home Office in immigration cases, the Parole Board in challenges by prisoners, and the Ministry of Defence in matters relating to injuries sustained in battle.
Appointed Attorney General in 2020, Ms Braverman served as Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department for Exiting the European Union from January to November 2018. She was elected as the Conservative MP for Fareham in May 2015.
In February 2018, she married Rael Braverman at the House of Commons. They had their first child in 2019 and their second child in 2021.
In July 2022, she called for Boris Johnson to resign following several Government scandals such as Partygate. She stood in the ensuing Tory Party leadership election, but was eliminated from the race in the second round of ballots, winning 27 votes. This was a reduction on her vote in the first round and the lowest of the remaining candidates.
She then endorsed Liz Truss as prime minister.
She replaced Priti Patel as home secretary in September 2022 after Ms Truss became prime minister.
What are her views?
Ms Braverman is a hard Brexiteer and said she had “significant reservations about our relationship with the European Court of Human Rights“. This followed the European court’s decision to effectively ground the first flight to send asylum seekers out of the UK.
Ms Braverman has previously said schools do not have to accommodate transgender pupils. She said schools did not have to use trans pupils’ chosen names or pronouns or let them wear a uniform that aligns with their gender identity.
When four people were cleared of tearing down a statue of slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol, Ms Braverman came under fire for saying she was considering whether to refer the case to the Court of Appeal.
What has been said about her defection?
The Conservative Party has suggested that Ms Braverman’s “mental health” was a factor in her defection to Reform UK.
In a statement released this afternoon, a spokesperson said the former home secretary had been “clearly very unhappy”, saying it was a “matter of when, not if” she would defect.
A spokesperson for the Conservative Party said in a statement: “It was always a matter of when, not if, Suella would defect. The Conservatives did all we could to look after Suella’s mental health, but she was clearly very unhappy.
“She says she feels that she has ‘come home’, which will come as a surprise to the people who chose not to elect a Reform MP in her constituency in 2024.
“There are some people who are MPs because they care about their communities and want to deliver a better country.
“There are others who do it for their personal ambition. Suella stood for leader of the Conservatives in 2022 and came sixth, behind Kemi [Badenoch] and Tom Tugendhat.
“In 2024 she could not even muster enough supporters to get on the ballot. She has now decided to try her luck with Nigel Farage, who said last year he didn’t want her in Reform. They really are doing our ‘Spring cleaning’!
“As always happens with Reform, they unveil defections just when the Labour government is tearing itself to pieces – Rayner, Mandelson, now Burnham.
“Reform are too busy opposing the Conservatives to hold the Labour government to account.
“The Conservative party is now the only party that believes in smaller government, less welfare and Britain living within its means, and has the team and the experience to get Britain working again.”
