Suella Braverman should “concentrate on the job” rather than giving speeches, warned a former cabinet minister amid concerns she is trying to pitch herself as a future Tory leader.
Robert Buckland offered a warning to the home secretary after she set out her hardline vision and railed against “experts and elites” at a speech at the National Conservative Conference.
Speaking at an event arranged by a right-wing US think tank, Ms Braverman attacked “radical gender ideology” and blamed left-wing politics for “making people feel terrible about our past”.
Mr Buckland told Sky News: “I am saying to the home secretary, she has got a big job to do. I know she wants to do it. I think getting on and doing that job is exactly where she needs to be.”
The former justice secretary said: “I think all departmental ministers should stick to their brief and talk to their brief. We have scheduled conferences which can be used by senior members of the government.”
Asked if Ms Braverman was pitching herself to the party as a future leader, Mr Buckland said: “The top job is filled by Rishi Sunak.”
He added: “I want him and most Conservatives want him to stay post and to be our prime minister, winning a general election and governing our country with maturity. Now is the time for the team to work with him, to support him and to project the five priorities he set out.”
Mr Buckland – an ally of Mr Sunak who initially backed him in last year’s Tory leadership campaign before switching to Liz Truss – was a senior backer of Mr Sunak’s second leadership in October.
The former justice secretary has been critical of Ms Braverman’s Illegal Migration Bill, pushing for more safe and legal routes for refugees.
Addressing the National Conservatism Conference, Ms Braverman also argued that “you cannot have immigration without integration” and “the unexamined drive towards multiculturalism” is a “recipe for communal disaster”.
She was the star attraction of the first day of the three-day gathering in Westminster. She set out the Conservative philosophy instilled in her by her parents, recounting their arrival stories in the UK in move that will be seen in the context of her leadership ambitions.
Some Tory MPs have accused her of focusing on her personal ambitious to succeed Mr Sunak rather than focusing on the job.
“She’s not waiting for the election, but is pitching for prime minister now,” one unnamed minister told The Guardian. “You would think being home secretary was some side hustle.”
Another Tory MP said: “It was rather rich that she was highlighting the problems with our immigration system when she’s been in charge of it for the past nine months. It was all about her ambitions, not about improving things.”
Braverman’s speech interrupted by protesters at National Conservatism conference
A senior Tory close to Ms Braverman has called for his party to pursue “authentic” conservatism rather than the “sugar-free” version accepted “by our liberal masters” during a speech to the conference on Tuesday.
Sir John Hayes – a senior backer of the home secretary and chairs the “anti-woke” Common Sense Group of Tory MPs – warned that there was a “widening chasm between the people of Britain and the elite who profess to serve them”.
And the head of a US think tank has told a right-wing conference that left-wing forces are “at war with the West”.
Kevin Roberts, chair of Washington-based Heritage Foundation, used a speech at the National Conservatism conference on Tuesday to attack “globalists” and “ruling class contempt of everyday working families”.
“Which is why it reserves a singular hatred for the kind of conservatism represented by Donald Trump and [Florida governor] Ron DeSantis, by Brexit, by [Hungarian president] Viktor Orban, and yes by this conference.”
Monday’s gathering of right-wing conservatives in London began with an invocation of the spirit of Margaret Thatcher.
Opening the National Conservatism conference, chairman Christopher DeMuth said he had been “communing” with the late PM about the conference. He told delegates: “I am happy to report that she is totally on board.”