Why so much fuss over Stella Braverman?

[lastminutepanicking]

I’m just wondering who on earth cares? Can’t understand why this is such big news.

@Fladdermus she wasn’t happy to do the course! What baffles me is why she didn’t just pay the fine rather than get civil servants to play the system 🙄.

Well said 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

"I loathe the woman and she has done/said some appalling things. But it seems a perfectly reasonable question to ask in her position. She asked it, was told no, so took the points."

Then why did the Government's own Ethics & Proprietary Team (yes they have one) instruct officials to disregard Bravermans request?

That is not quite what happened though, is it?

You might be happy with a deceitful, xenophobic incompetent being in charge of the Home Office, but lots of people are a tad uncomfortable.

Thai thread shows what's wrong with our current set up.

You have people genuinely concerned about MPs breaking ministerial code, breaking the law, running our public services down etc.

The only defends Rory supporters can come up with is

"Misssssss - they used a word to call me I didn't like can I do the same?"

"Misssssss they said I called the illegals a swarm but I said invasion"

"Miisssssss they insist on picking up on small mistakes I've made but it was only a little one. Why are they picking on me?"

I'd actually have much more respect for avid Tory fans if they could argue factually what good they have and are doing for the country rather than tearing the valid arguments backed up with fact about the bad they are doing by pulling up arguments about how that is presented.

Everyone seems outraged that she asked civil servants the questions but in all likelihood wasn’t it her private Secretary she asked? Yes a civil servant but someone who manages her diary and carries out most tasks that a PA would.

Sadly she's still predicted to hold.

I won't be voting for her.

And I've told her to her face many a time

Private Secretaries are civil servants, not PA's.

"The request made officials feel deeply uneasy amid concerns that it would represent a breach of both the civil service code and the ministerial code.

The civil service code states explicitly that officials must not “act in a way that unjustifiably favours or discriminates against particular individuals or interests”. The ministerial code states that ministers should avoid conflicts between their public duties and private duties and should not ask officials to “act in any way which would conflict with the civil service code”.
From The Times today.

This is hilarious!

https://twitter.com/JamesBlunt/status/1660432857876013056

Eddie Marsan an English actor tweets "I had to do a speed awareness course and, as a famous actor, it was really humiliating…no one recognised me"

James Blunt replies... "Mine was on Zoom, and I thought I’d got away with not being recognised, till the instructor asked people if they could think of ways to keep calm whilst driving. Someone suggested listening to some James Blunt, and everyone pissed themselves" 🤣

Why does the likes of Braverman think she's something special? She tried to hide it with help from the Civil Service. Didn't work. Just do what everyone else has to do.

Suella “Hi Fred, I’ve received a speeding notice and wanted to go on a speed awareness course. Do you know if there’s the possibility to pay for a private one? After all, they’re anonymous but obviously everyone there will know who I am, so my right to privacy will be removed.”
Fred “Sorry Su, but I can’t help you there - it’s either the course or the penalty points”
Suella “OK, I’ll have to take the points”

Some days later in the HoC toilets…
Fred “Hey guess what Joe, Su asked me if she’d be able to do a private speed awareness course”
Joe “Thats shocking, ring the Daily Mail!”

Lovely bit of creative writing there Soontobe60 - entirely missing out on the bit where she made the request by email and the Ethics Team had to get involved.
It was against both the Ministerial Code and the Civil Service Code but I am guessing neither of those bother Braverman supporters.

For those posters who don’t see why it’s a big deal (obviously not the terminal cases who can’t think beyond “Tory = good, Labour = bad”) - if you’ve never been a Civil Servant, you perhaps don’t understand the importance of the Civil Service Code. It requires that we be politically neutral in our working life and how we represent the Service, that we work to implement the policies of the government of the day, regardless of party, and that we remember we are funded by public taxation. It influences how we do our job on a daily basis; breaching it will mean a disciplinary (up to and including dismissal depending on the seriousness of the breach). We are reminded of it every time there’s an election at any level, or a major issue that may result in press interest. Breaching the code is A Big Thing.

What we are not, and what Ministers must not use us as (as per the Ministerial code) is their personal dogsbody service. We are not employed to buy their spouse’s Christmas present, pick up their dry cleaning, valet their car, fill out their mortgage application - or sort out their speeding tickets. How could we be? All of you on this thread who pay taxes would be paying for us to do those things rather than implement and maintain policies and public services, which is what we are actually employed to do.

To place a Civil Service in the position where they are being asked to break the Code is one of the worst things a Minister can do to their staff. It asks us to compromise our ethics and puts our job at risk. It is a misuse of their ministerial authority and holds both the Civil Service itself and the taxpayer in contempt.

And that’s why this is a big deal. Not the speeding, not the desire for a 1:1 course. It’s not what Braverman did that’s so reprehensible, it’s how she tried to do it and what that says about the contempt she has for ethics, for standards in public office, for codes of conduct and for you, the general public whose taxes pay the wages of those she tried to pressurise into doing her personal, non-work-related bidding.

It won't have been like that. She wanted something special... a one to one private course. Why couldn't she ask them herself directly? I'll tell you why... she thought she might get special treatment if she went via her staff.

Against the Ministerial Code

Go on then, what actually DID happen? I don’t just mean what do you THINK happened, but what are the actual facts?

*defines how we represent…

Well, clearly not happy to do the course at all.... there is no security angle to this via Zoom

Why is she so special?

& then trying to get the fine on expenses!!! FFS she hardly short of money.

And *place a Civil Servant…

Oh, for a 10 minute edit button!

Whose Rory?

And who is this 'Missssssssss'?

The fact that they are called a "private" secretary does not mean that they are paid by the taxpayer to deal with the Minister's private/personal matters.

@Soontobe60 mmm thats just your version of events, or are you Fred?

thats the whole point of the ethics advisor... Braverman accepts an inquiry and we can all find out the details and whether she did abuse her position or not.

Well... put it this way, the Tory party won't have much leverage after they lose and complain about Labour ministers breaching the Ministerial Code.

This is what they should think about - they're clearing the way for a large space to abuse power. Your opponents will use it and not in your favour.

Anyway, Suella is very unpopular in the UK. Less popular than Sunak! If they made her leader after the election the Tory party would have decided that they didn't like the UK or it's people.

'It won't have been like that. She wanted something special... a one to one private course. Why couldn't she ask them herself directly? I'll tell you why... she thought she might get special treatment if she went via her staff.'

Hmm maybe busy doing Home Secretary things and thought reasonable to ask a spad to see if a 1 to 1 was possible? Not, armed robbery you understand just a 1 to 1 speeding awareness course. Seems reasonable to me.

Not reasonable at all.

Even I know it would be out of order to do that (Ministerial Code, anyone?) If she doesn't know this, she shouldn't be in the job. It was a private matter, it was up to her to deal with it, not her staff with hope of a favour of a one to one.

But, given she breaks MC as a matter of course, it's not surprising.

It was a personal matter. Civil servants aren't paid to sort out personal matters.
Given when this happened Braverman had just been sacked for breaching the Ministerial Code and forwarding on confidential information to John Hayes' wife you'd think she would have been a bit more thoughtful.

I don't remember any STELLA on Dallas...