MANCHESTER, England (AP) 鈥 Britain鈥檚 Home Secretary Suella Braverman railed against unauthorized migrants, human-rights laws and "woke" critics of her hardline policies Tuesday as she tried to secure her place as the flag-bearer of the Conservative Party鈥檚 law-and-order right wing.
In her keynote speech to the , Braverman called migration a 鈥渉urricane鈥 that would bring 鈥渕illions more immigrants to these shores, uncontrolled and unmanageable.鈥
She said British governments had been 鈥渇ar too squeamish about being smeared as racist to properly bring order to the chaos.鈥 But the Conservatives, she said, would give Britain 鈥渟trong borders.鈥
Braverman hailed the government鈥檚 moves to make it harder for migrants to seek asylum in Britain, including that requires anyone arriving in small boats across the English Channel to be detained and then deported permanently to their home nation or third countries.
Despite being passed by Parliament earlier this year, the law has not yet taken effect. The only third country that has agreed to take migrants from Britain is Rwanda, and no one has yet been sent there as that plan is being
Braverman's speech to party activists had the feel of an election rally. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak鈥檚 Conservatives are lagging behind Labour in opinion polls with an election due by the end of 2024. Many members attending the four-day conference that ends Wednesday in Manchester are looking ahead to a leadership contest that would likely follow a defeat.
Braverman, a Cambridge-educated lawyer, is unofficially campaigning for the support of the party鈥檚 populist right wing by advocating ever-tougher curbs on migration and a war on human rights protections and liberal social values. She quipped that the Human Rights Act should be called the 鈥淐riminal Rights Act,鈥 said trans women should not be allowed on single-sex female hospital wards and vowed to remove 鈥済ender ideology, white privilege, anti-British history鈥 from education and cultural institutions.
Braverman makes some Conservatives worry the party is regaining its image as 鈥渢he nasty party,鈥 as former Prime Minister Theresa May once called it. In recent years the party has worked to shed its image as a bastion of jingoistic 鈥淟ittle Englanders鈥 and to attract a more diverse membership. Sunak is Britain鈥檚 first prime minister of color, Braverman also has Indian roots, and several other high-profile Cabinet members also have immigrant parents or grandparents.
Braverman said her critics had 鈥渢ried to make me into a hate figure, because I tell the truth -- the blunt unvarnished truth about what is happening in our country.鈥
It鈥檚 an open question whether Braverman鈥檚 tough views will work on the party, or the country.
Delegates greeted her speech with loud applause, but one Conservative politician in the room was led out by security after challenging Braverman鈥檚 views on gender.
Andrew Boff, a member of the London Assembly, said Braverman has been talking 鈥渢rash鈥 about gender and 鈥渕aking our Conservative Party look transphobic and homophobic.鈥
鈥淭his home secretary was basically vilifying gay people and trans people by this attack on LGBT ideology, or gender ideology,鈥 he said. 鈥淚t is fictitious, it is ridiculous.鈥
