TRIGGERnometry - Suella Braverman: “We Are Not in Control of Our Border”

Episode Date: February 28, 2024

Suella Braverman is a Conservative Party politician who served as Home Secretary from 6 September 2022 - 19 October 2022, and again from 25 October 2022 - 13 November 2023. She has been the Member of Parliament for Fareham since 2015. She was chair of the European Research Group from 2017 - 2018 and Attorney General for England and Wales from 2020 - March 2021, and again from September 2021 - 2022. Join our Premium Membership for early access, extended and ad-free content: https://triggernometry.supercast.com SPONSOR: Dissident Dialogues, New York, May 3rd - 4th. Buy your tickets now at https://dissidentdialogues.org/ 10% discount for TRIGGERnometry members here: https://triggernometry.locals.com/upost/5239585/dissident-dialogues-discount SPONSOR: https://GETSUPERBEETS.COM Use Promo Code: TRIG to get a free 30-day supply + 15% off your first order Support TRIGGERnometry Here: Bitcoin: bc1qm6vvhduc6s3rvy8u76sllmrfpynfv94qw8p8d5 Music by: Music by: Xentric | [e-mail] | https://www.xentricapc.com/ YouTube: @xentricapc Buy Merch Here: https://www.triggerpod.co.uk/shop/ Advertise on TRIGGERnometry: [e-mail] Join the Mailing List: https://www.triggerpod.co.uk/#mailinglist Find TRIGGERnometry on Social Media: https://twitter.com/triggerpod https://www.facebook.com/triggerpod/ https://www.instagram.com/triggerpod/ About TRIGGERnometry: Stand-up comedians Konstantin Kisin (@konstantinkisin) and Francis Foster (@francisjfoster) make sense of politics, economics, free speech, AI, drug policy and WW3 with the help of presidential advisors, renowned economists, award-winning journalists, controversial writers, leading scientists and notorious comedians. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The simple fact is we are not in control of our southern border. It's now time to leave the European Convention on Human Rights. And why haven't we already? Well, unfortunately, I was a lone voice advocating that around the cabinet table. It just seems that the Conservative Party can't actually implement their policies. You, the government, previous governments have failed to do it. Why? Why is it happening? We keep voting. We keep saying we want to deal with this issue. Nothing happens. Why? Ultimately, there has been a political resistance.

The Prime Minister didn't want to engage in this subject and didn't want to deliver on it. You'd have to ask him. There was a huge mountain of resistance that I was met with from the Treasury itself. Don't give me a politician's answer, because we both know your party, to put it very bluntly, is screwed. Do you think you will win the next election?

Well, I have said already, already on the evidence before us, we are heading for electoral oblivion. Things can change. There is still time. And that is why it is my constant plea to the Prime Minister to change course. So, Ella, welcome to the show. You're a recent and former Home Secretary. So the stuff we want to talk to about was very much the stuff that was in your brief when you were in that job. Before we do, I just so would be interesting to find out a little bit about who you are. How did, because, you know, the way politics seems to happen nowadays is sort of this person pops up and suddenly the media tells you who they are and then that's the opinion everyone has. Who are you? How did you get here? Well, I'm a mum. First and foremost, I have two young children. I'm someone who has been originally born in London in Wembley. My parents are from Mauritius and Kenya. They came here in the 1960s with.

pretty much nothing. And we are proud patriots, very proud and grateful to be part of this great country, this amazing country, Britain's done for the world. And I grew up in London. I worked as a barrister for a decade, the self-employed bar. And then I was elected to Parliament as a Conservative MP for the wonderful constituency of Fairham in Hampshire. And so it's probably coming up to nine years that I've been a conservative politician. It's interesting that you say something that we do not hear, not just politicians, but anyone say anymore, which is the wonderful things Britain has done for the world. What are you talking about?

So I thought we were just evil and, you know, empire and all of that. What has Britain done for about it? Well, you'd be forgiven for having that view, wouldn't you, today? Because it's very unfashionable to talk about the greatness of Britain and Britain's contribution to civilisation over the centuries. But reasons why I admire our country, indeed why my parents who were children of empire, children of empire, who grew up admiring the mother country in Britain and the British Empire, our manifold. It was Britain that brought us Magna Carta, the basis of our common law system and civil liberties. It's Britain

that is the home of parliamentary democracy. Our houses of parliament is the mother of all parliaments and has emulated the world over for a reason because of its structure and its constancy. It's Britain that led the industrial revolution. It's Britain that fought protectionism. It's Britain that abolished slavery. It's Britain that has led the fight against the Nazis in World War II.

It's Britain that has led the new chapter for the West in terms of self-government. and supremacy when it comes to Brexit. It's Britain that's led many bold and courageous moves on diplomacy and foreign policy, not least in terms of the fight against Putin and the fight against Islamism around the world. So I'm incredibly proud of what Britain has represented

over the centuries, and I'm very optimistic for our country in the future. And you mentioned your parents coming over as children of empire. We have heard some people who say, people who say, well, you know, a lot of people who did come over, and including the Windrass Generation, they came over with these grand expectations, but perhaps were not treated so well when they got here. Was that your parents' experience here? Listen, my parents came here for kind of different reasons. My father was of Asian origin and was born in Nairobi in Kenya,

and in the 1960s he was effectively expelled from East Africa with many of the Asian people. And he didn't want to come to the United Kingdom. He loved Kenya and he loved Africa, actually. But he had no choice. And it was Britain that offered him shelter. It was Britain that offered him opportunity and safety. And so he came here.

I think he was 19 years old with nothing, no money, no family, no friends. and he feels very grateful for the opportunities that Britain gave him. He started from very humble beginnings on the shop floor of a paint factory, and he's made his life here. And, you know, he's never been back to Kenya. He's now an old man. He wouldn't mind me saying that about him, but he's in his 70s. But he feels very proud and grateful for Britain's welcome

and the camaraderie of the British people. Of course, there was hostility. when he first came. That's well chronicled. But overall, this was a welcoming country for him and has allowed him to lead a very safe and prosperous life. My mother, on the other hand, was actually much more willing to come to the United Kingdom.

She was recruited as an 18-year-old girl by the NHS in Mauritius after the war. And she came here in the 1960s, really, because she wanted to leave the confines of a small island and she wanted to better herself. And the NHS was a symbol, a beacon of excellence and opportunity for her. And to be part of Britain was a great honour for her.

And she worked for 45 years as a nurse. She served as a Conservative counsellor for about 16 years. And she too would say that she's incredibly proud of what Britain gave her here as a young adult, but also of what the British Empire did for her country, Mauritius. If you look at what the British did in those countries, they brought the civil service. They brought the ports, the infrastructure, the education system, the legal system, many of the structures that are used today. And, you know, those are wholly good things. And Suwlett, why are you conservative?

Because there is this narrative, particularly amongst the left, that if you are the product of a second generation immigrant or first generation immigrant, you should actually be on the left. You should be a Labour supporter. Again, that's a really good question, because as you say, there's a perception that if you're from an ethnic minority, you can't possibly be of the right or a member of the Conservative family. And I'm a Conservative because I believe fundamentally an aspiration.

And I believe that it doesn't matter what skin colour you have, where your parents, what your parents do, how rich you are, what school you went to, there's no limits on what you can achieve with an attitude of ingenuity, determination, personal responsibility. I think that's one of the defining aspects that I really relate to when it comes to the conservative philosophy, personal responsibility, service, community, family, fairness. And I think that those values are what have made our party great over the years, and which can be very inspirational. We have many stories in our conservative

heritage of people overcoming the odds, starting with very little, but through their own efforts and their determination, achieving huge success for the benefit of the greater good. I think that's a wonderfully empowering and inspiring vision that I hold dear to my heart. Look, I quite agree with you, but touching on the Conservative Party, it seems to me, not to put too fine a point of it, but the Conservative Party is in crisis. When they actually, with what they say they're going to achieve and they consistently fail time after time when you look at issues like immigration, when you look at issues like housing. It just seems that the Conservative Party can't actually implement their policies. Listen, I'm proud to be a conservative and I think we've achieved a lot

over the last decade. But I also agree we've got to be honest about where we've fallen short. immigration, I'm afraid, is one area. Well, we have to be honest about not just the conservative governance of it, but also actually previous Labour administrations, because if you look at migration and particularly net migration, legal migration, let's park the issue of the small boats aside for a moment, but the issue over which we have control, administration after administration has roundly failed to lower incoming numbers, lower net migration, despite promises being made to the British people and despite the British people voting time and time again for lower overall numbers. You know, I voted for Brexit partially because I wanted to lower migration. I campaigned for it.

It's a very difficult decision for me to take as a new MP. I had to have a conversation with the then Prime Minister David Cameron. I hadn't been an MP for a year at that stage. And, you know, no one wants to go against the boss at that point in your career anyway. And, you know, I had to say to him, Prime Minister, I'm unable to support you. I'm unable to vote to remain in the European Union because we need to lower the numbers coming into this country. And we'll only be able to do that if we're outside of the EU. So Brexit was a call by the British people to lower numbers. The 2019 general election and our manifesto pledge was a call from the British people to lower numbers. And I'm afraid, if you look at the recent numbers, as of November,

we have 700,000 net migration coming into this country compared to 240,000 in 2019. So the numbers have more than tripled. And I think that we need to do better on legal migration. So if I were a mainstream journalist, this would be my gotcha moment, an opportunity to go, well, you were the Home Secretary, why didn't you? Which, by the way, is a fair question to some extent. And we can get into that. I am more interested more broadly about the point you actually made,

consecutive governments over decades now have absolutely not delivered on the things that they have told and promised the British people. Why is that? I hear various rumors, you know, the civil service ideologically just won't let it happen. You know, the Treasury is more interested in growth than delivering on the promises about it. We just care about the economy, or rather the numbers that we can then sell to the British public so much that this issue goes by the way side. You've been there. You've been in charge of the department that is there to control this issue, And you, the government, previous governments have failed to do it. Why?

Why is it happening? That's what so many people say to us. Like, we keep voting, we keep saying we want to deal with this issue. Nothing happens. Why? Well, having served as Home Secretary, I think ultimately there has been a political resistance to seriously grapple with the challenges posed by the challenges posed by the, unprecedented and unprecedented levels of migraine.

So, sorry, to interrupt. What does political resistance mean? Who are you talking about? Is it the civil service? Is it your own party? Is it the media? Who is causing this not to happen? Well, I can speak only from my own experience and what I've observed.

Please. You know, I think that, you know, for my part, I've been very eager to deliver on that policy. to lower net migration. And technically, it's very easy to do, actually, from a home office or government point of view. You don't need to pass a law. You don't need to worry about human rights

or the court in Strasbourg. You don't need to get any new votes on it. You actually just have to take an administrative and executive decision to do it. And I had the hope that I would be able to do that. And unfortunately, I was met with a lot of resistance from around the cabinet table. And the Prime Minister, you know, didn't want to engage in this subject and didn't want to deliver on it. You'd have to ask him.

Why do you think? You say the cabinet table, that means more than one person, right? So we're talking about a conservative party elected on the promise to lower migration in 2010 to the tens of thousands. We are so far off that. And yet you're saying people within the cabinet of that very government are not keen. And I don't think they're bad people. I don't think the people in the labor government necessarily were bad people. So the question is, why?

Is it because we just care more about importing cheap labor to staff the NHS? And so the other departments are like, well, if you do this, we're not getting enough foreign students. We're not going to have enough of an economic business. Is that what's happening? That is effectively the character of the resistance I came up against. So the economic departments, mainly the Treasury, would be very resistant to my proposals to cut net migration. So, for example, on workers, you know, my proposal for over a year was we needed to raise the salary threshold. It was 20,000, that's below the average salary in the UK.

It should have been, I put forward, 40,000. There was a huge mountain of resistance that I was. was met with from the Treasury itself. You know, that was reported at the time that I was having to chase the Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt down the corridor in my efforts to persuade him and sit him down to have the discussion. That was true. That did happen.

That illustrates that ministers didn't want to talk about this because there was a prevailing treasury orthodoxy that... set out the view that more people coming into the country was necessarily good for the economy. I dispute that view. But that is the view of the OBR, was the view of the OBR traditionally. They might have been softening that view recently. But generally speaking, the economic departments work on the basis that more people, more economic units coming into the country can only be good for growth.

But the issue is with that, whether you agree or disagree. agree with that, it's kind of irrelevant, isn't it? Because the people voted to lower immigration. Therefore, that's one of, that's something that the government should have done. Really? Do you see what I mean? I agree with you, because there's a real problem with the levels of migration that we are carrying at the moment. This, one, there's no mandate for it. And we're doing categorically what the British people do not want. Secondly, it's imposing undue burden on our public services, whether it's the NHS, whether it's school places or whether it's on housing supply. Thirdly, it depresses wages. You know, we know that more people coming into this country are taking jobs at lower levels, at lower wages.

And really, what we need employers to do is raise wages. So we create that high-skilled, high-wage economy. And lastly, I think the pace of migration is causing real damage to community cohesion and the social fabric of our country because people are coming from countries where their culture is sometimes at odds with British values and British culture. And I think we are seeing that play out in a very worrying way on our streets, but this is only going to get worse in years to come. What do you mean by that, Suella? You've just made that comment. I think I know what you mean, but what do you actually mean by that? I mean that if you, you know, if you look at, if you take a hard honest look at our country,

we have towns and cities around the United Kingdom where multiculturalism has failed, where communities are living parallel lives, where people come here and they don't speak the language, where they come here and they don't want to take part in British life, They don't want to integrate. And in fact, they actively loathe what Britain stands for. And they are in Britain, but not of Britain. And I think that's something we need to talk about and we need to face up to because I think that's going to pose, it's already posing,

real issues with community cohesion unifying our country at a time when we desperately need unity. and actually trying to heal some of the divisions in our country. Because that, I can't believe that that is a taboo topic. Is it, they just simply worried about being called a racist, a bigot? Is that what's going on here with people refusing to comment on it or address the subject? I think that there is an element of that. I think many politicians don't like talking about cultural, challenges. They don't like saying that certain communities are not signing up to the British way of life

out of fear of being called racist. And it's that, you know, that readiness generally by the left to jump on anyone who might utter something like that and call them a racist, a bigot, a xenophore, has a real chilling effect. And I think that many politicians would rather just avoid the subject. Because you experienced that when you were Home Secretary. Now, people can say the language that you use could have been described as inflammatory when you were talking about illegal immigration.

But to compare it to 1930s Germany, as I think Gary Lineca did, is quite frankly demented. As somebody whose mother is an immigrant, first-generate-immigrant immigrant herself? Yes, that's an example of the hysterical reaction that people get when they're raising very reasonable and necessary issues

which go to the heart of what it means to be British. And if people are going to react like that, every time someone tries to grapple with this subject will be in a sensitive way, we're not going to get very far and we're not going to solve the problem that is patently, there. Okay, let's talk about another aspect of this issue because, okay, I hear the argument,

we need immigrants to come in, do the jobs there for the economy. I think that's incredibly dangerous, by the way, for your party to be doing, because if you make it clear to the British public that there's no democracy, I can't vote to achieve the result that I want, why would I support, A, your party and be democracy as a principle? I really think that's a serious danger that we're dealing with here. But at least I understand the rationale, if you're the of a department that needs workers or whatever, you will push for that. I get it. Why on earth are tens of thousands of people coming into this country every year illegally? That can't be beneficial to this country, even economically. Even on that argument, that doesn't make any sense.

Why is that happening? Well, on illegal migration, we have a real problem with controlling our borders, I'm afraid, and the simple fact is we are not in control of our southern border on the South Coast, because at the moment it is being exploited by tens of thousands of illegal arrivals every year. That is undermining our public safety, it's undermining our border control, it's undermining our national security as well. Why have we not managed to fix it? The reason we've not managed to fix it is because we've not been able to deliver our policy of deterrence, we've not been able to deliver our policy of deterrence, i.e. Rwanda, because, plainly speaking, the interference of a politicised and interventionist court in Strasbourg, namely the European

Court of Human Rights, and its application of the European Convention on Human Rights. So the simple answers, we've not been able to control our borders because of an elastic and disproportionate interpretation of human rights laws. But I didn't vote for the court in Strasbourg, and neither did the British people. So why don't we leave? Why don't we leave the convention? Why don't we... I mean, look, maybe I'm not a political expert, but I generally had the idea that democracy

meant that the people of this country get to vote for the way that this country is run. I don't know anyone who's in favor of legal immigration, including many of my friends on the left. Nobody wants this, and somehow we're still clinging to a policy or a court or whatever that makes us do things that none of us want. How is this possible? possible? Well, we are a member. We are a signatory to the European Convention on Human Rights. We are a member of the Council of Europe, the institution that governs the convention. And we are subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights.

We've signed up legally and constitutionally to all of that institutional framework. So at the moment, we have to abide by it. My view is we've reached the point now, particularly because of our, you know, the impediment that it poses to our controlling of the borders, but also on many other policy areas, actually, it's now time to leave the European Convention on Human Rights. And why haven't we already? Well, unfortunately, I was a lone voice advocating that around the cabinet table. And the issue, you know, the reality of working in government is even if your home secretary, you cannot act unilaterally. You do need collective agreement.

You do need the support of mainly the... Prime Minister and ideally the majority of your Cabinet and ministerial colleagues before you do anything. So that is unfortunately why we've not been able to stop the boats. That's also actually why we've not been able to take action soon enough on legal migration. I didn't have collective agreement. I didn't have the support of the Prime Minister. I apologize if I'm asking stupid questions, but what is the rationale for your Cabinet colleagues to not want to do this? I don't understand. Well, their argument is that it's far too radical.

It would put us in the same category as Russia and Belarus, who have left the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights, and it would be damaging to our international reputation. Can we not have our own code that makes sure that we are protecting the human rights of people in these situations, but in a way that the British public approve of? Well, that would be my proposal. European Convention on Human Rights, and in doing so complete the job of Brexit, that would enable us to take back control of our laws and our borders. We leave the jurisdiction of the

foreign court, which is politicised and interventionist, and we actually design and deliver our own Bill of Rights here in the United Kingdom by the UK Parliament with a mandate from the UK population, and which is applied by UK judges in UK courts. That, I believe, is a much better and legitimate way of protecting people's rights and civil liberties, which I care passionately about, but also enabling democratically elected politicians to be held to account on their decisions.

So, look, wouldn't you say, and look, push back on this, if you will, the average person on the street who voted for Brexit, which obviously the majority of people in this country did, would be like, oh, do we even have Brexit if we can't control our borders because a court in Strasbourg tells us that we can't? Is that Brexit? It doesn't sound like it to me.

I think the convention, the European Convention on Human Rights was left untouched when we left the European Union. They are two distinct and separate entities. And so a lot of people will have assumed that we left the Convention, that we left the Strasbourg Court when we left the European Union. That was not the case. And actually, that's why I feel very passionate

that we do need to now leave the Convention on Human Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights, because it will actually complete the job of Brexit. It will restore supremacy to the UK Parliament. We will be able to control our borders. We will be able to control our laws and we won't be governed by a foreign court. And those were the arguments behind Brexit.

And so, you know, I think there's a very compelling argument for departure from the Convention on Human Rights. Because to me, again, I'm not a lawyer. I'm not an expert in human rights. But when I see a country that is unable to police and protect its borders, what it says to me is that we're not in charge of our own destiny in any shape or form. because if you can't even protect something as basic as your own borders, how are you in control of your destiny? And the reality is, for me, I don't think we are.

I think there's something in that because ultimately, the situation we have when it comes to border control is that an asylum seeker can come to the UK illegally and they can claim human rights protections based on a whole range of things, whether that's, as we saw tragically recently, false claims that they may have converted from Islam to Christianity, claims that they may have a family member in the UK,

claims that they might be a political dissident of the Iranian regime, and therefore to be returned there would be harmful to their welfare. All of those kinds of claims enable them to plead human rights in a way that trumps the human rights of the British people to live in a country where their borders are secure. All of those kinds of claims allow foreign criminals to claim their human rights in a way that prevails over the human rights of victims

and the British people to live in a safe country. I think that balance is totally out of kilter. And that's why, despite trying to fix the problem within the framework for decades, it's now time to leave the European Convention on Human Rights. Because you just touched on it very briefly there, which is a case of Abdulazidi, somebody who was an illegal immigrant into this country, who then committed a heinous attack against a woman and her children, using a corrosive substance.

And me and everybody else is thinking to themselves, why are you even here? You should have been ejected at the... And he was a sex offender on top of that. And granted asylum after he committed a sex offender. I mean, how does that happen? Really shocking. But what would have happened is that he would have claimed human rights protections,

whether that's under the Refugee Convention, which is another international document to which we're subject, or the European Convention on Human Rights, he will have claimed, well, I'm a Christian. I'm a Christian now. and because of my God-fearing, devout Christianity, you cannot send me back to my country of origin because I will be persecuted because Christians in my Muslim country of origin

are tortured. And he will have claimed that. And he will have done that pretty easily. It's quite easy in this country to claim human rights and for judges to uphold the human rights of foreign criminals, illegal migrants, and people who really shouldn't be here. So, Ella, let me ask you a question. I know that there's a lot of politicking around this going on,

but how does this get fixed? It's no secret that I think, you know, you've made a couple of digs at the prime minister. It's no secret that I'm sure you'd like to be leader one day to implement your vision of the direction this country should go in. But if you can't even get a cabinet to agree to deal with this issue, even if you were elected as leader of the Conservative Party at some point and even if you led a government, if your party doesn't support the idea of stopping this by leaving the ECHR, how is this going to get fixed? Well, I mean, I think if we take legal migration, for example, you know, whilst in government, I was able to persuade the Prime Minister to take some men. some minimal measures on students and the dependence on students.

Because a large number of the people coming into this country are not actually workers, they're actually the dependence of workers or the dependence of students. The foreign students community has skyrocketed in the last few years alone. When I left office, the Prime Minister then did announce another package of measures on workers. So he decided to raise the salary threshold, threshold. There's a few other measures on dependence of workers. And I think that change can be achieved by being vocal about what the British people really want. You know, I found that actually I can achieve more outside government than within government because I can speak freely. I was unable

to argue the case forcefully with public support from within government. When I was outside government, I was able to make the case much more powerfully in public with a lot of public support. And on that basis, I think the government had to respond, also given the numbers of 700,000, which were unprecedented and extremely high. And by the way, I'll be honest with you, it will sound to people, people who are not familiar with our channel, like we're two remain voters, France's second generation immigrant through his mother, I'm a first generation, you're a descendant of immigrants.

I actually don't think the British public against immigration. It's never been my experience. When I came to this country in 1995, I think 3% of the British public thought that immigration was a major issue because it was in the tens of thousands. It wasn't that big a deal. It wasn't disruptive to the country. But I tell you now, and I can, from speaking to lots of people, if the government and this country and the people who run it carry on down this path,

we will get to a point where people are anti-immigration. if this carries on. That's why it's the job of the Conservative Party, moderate centre-right party, to actually deal with this in a sensible and pragmatic way. If we don't, then it will give rise

to a more far-right sentiment and people will take a more hostile view towards immigration. You're absolutely right. I'm not against immigration. You know, my own herringage bears that out, but also, you know, we're a richer country because people come here

and they want to contribute to our economy and take part in our country. country, but we need to also do it in a way that recognises we have finite resources and we cannot welcome everybody who wants to come to this country. That is the simple truth. And so we need a regime that enables some control. And if you just take one aspect, you know, on international students, as I said, the number has exponentially grown in recent years. And it's become a backdoor route into the UK, whereby instead of getting the most talented or the best and the brightest brains from around the globe to come to this country, it's turned into a route for low-grade universities

to accept poorly qualified people, largely from developing countries, to come into this country to do low-grade courses, the most popular course is a short business studies course in a low-ranking university, they'll generally bring their partner, their spouse, with them, and they won't bother to attend. No one will enforce their attendance or check whether they're actually studying for this qualification, and they will disappear into the black market and the deliver rule market and work on the black market illegally. And then they will aim to stay here because earning in this country, even on a low paid job, can be far higher than many countries pay. And so that's why we've seen a lot of remittances and money transfer companies expand because people are sending money back

to their countries of origin. The universities, the foreign students issue, I believe, has been become a racket, whereby a large number of universities are selling. immigration, not education. And I'm afraid we do need to take meaningful steps to stop that. I've put forward proposals. They've not been accepted, but I will still keep arguing for the necessary steps that need to be taken to clamp down on this back route into life in the UK. Isn't that just a form of corruption, to be brutally honest with you? You know that these, not you, but these universities know what is going on. They conceive from their enrollments to people who turn up.

They come over, they enroll, and then after one or two classes they drop out, there's a consistent theme right the way through. They know what's going on, don't it? I'm afraid a lot of these universities are complicit in what has become a money-making scheme. And the way it works is that these universities, which are not very good,

will make their money through foreign students. That's their source of revenue. so they will jealously guard this source of income. They don't really care what happens once people arrive. And many of the students will not attend, will not complete and will go off and work. We also know of some universities paying agents to go and recruit overseas to recruit students

and offer them false documentation, false qualification so that they can meet the entry requirements. We've seen a lot of abuse of this system, and that's why it's necessary to rein it in and take necessary. Take the care worker visa. I'm afraid that's also become a root of abuse in our immigration system. We've seen countless examples where people will come here to the UK on a care worker's visa only for it to be discovered that there's no care home, which is actually employing them. they don't have the necessary qualifications to be looking after the vulnerable people who they're supposed to be looking after. And it's been a sham.

And again, it's being exploited as a backdoor into the UK. So tighter enforcement is required. I started this work when I was Home Secretary. But it needs to be amplified considerably if we are to properly get a grip on what's become abuse of our immigration rules. And moving on now, obviously being high. Home Secretary, one of your remits was the police force. And as somebody who has lived in this city for the majority of their life is a Londoner, it seems to me that law and order in the capital city, but also across the UK,

we're in a bad place, aren't we, to put it bluntly. When you look at things like knife crime in particular. Sure, there are many challenges. I'm, you know, having served as Home Secretary, I worked very closely with the police. And, you know, even to this day, I am fiercely pro-police. And I hope my track record reflects that. I fought for greater powers for the police to make their jobs easier when it comes to using stop and search or arresting militant protesters.

We passed a new law specifically to make their jobs easier. I fought for higher pay. We secured one of the highest pay settlements. for the police, even accounting for the difficult fiscal environment. I went in to bat for the police because I thought that, you know, the police can't strike. The police make huge sacrifice. You know, I've met loads of both Rankinfile and also senior police officers, retired police officers, new recruits.

And I was always blown away by the level of dedication and the bravery. bravery that frankly you or I would never be able to appreciate. And there are countless stories that I came across of remarkable bravery, remarkable boldness, courage and effectiveness that will never be on the front pages. And most, the vast majority of police officers have that in their blood. They sign up to do this work, which is really hard work, because they're brave people and because they want to keep people safe and they want to serve the country. That's all incredibly admirable.

So, you know, I think there is a lot of good. There's a lot of good in our police falls. I also fought for more police officers. We recruited the highest ever number on record in terms of police officers on my watch. So there is a lot of good. I'm also proud of our track record over the last decade. You know, we've got a record number of police officers.

We've also actually seen a fall in crime overall. I know it might not feel that way, but if you compare on a like-for-like basis over the last decade, crime overall has fallen by about 50%. So you say it might not feel that way. Why doesn't it feel that way then? So those are all the good things. And being dispatched. And by the way, just so you know, we've had police officers on the show. Anytime I meet an officer or someone who serves in armed forces, I always thank them for the service. It's a difficult job and they deserve utter respect. But it is also true that the experience of the ordinary person, on the ground is your car gets broken into,

you get a crime reference number for your insurance, that's about it, right? So why doesn't it feel like we are safer? Yeah. So that was what I really came to grapple with as Home Secretary, that despite those, you know, the good things, people don't feel safer. Public confidence is very low in the police.

People feel that there's no point calling the police now. got to that point. And so I was very interested in what we needed to do to restore trust and rebuild confidence. And the reason why I believe it's got to that position is because I think there's been a disproportionate focus on higher harm crimes, which is, you know, important and necessary, but to the detriment of And I hesitate with using this term because it's, but lower harm, because there's no such thing as lower harm. But lower harm crimes. So the antisocial behavior, the criminal damage, the vandalism,

the robberies that, I mean, they can be very serious harm. Burgery, the kind of everyday crime, I do feel that to a degree, resource has been diverted away from those kinds of crimes. To what kinds of crimes? To higher harm crimes. Like what? serious organised crime, violence against women and girls, rape, serious sexual offences, homicide,

and other violent kind of crime. My job was I wanted to try and pivot the police and their resource to focus on that crime which most people will come into contact with and actually reflects the efficacy of their service. And that's why we set out an antisocial behaviour action plan. That's why I made it easier for them to use stop and search powers. I constantly told the police, I really want you to use stop and search.

I want you to say it's one of the best ways of saving lives on the streets. We increase their resources for this kind of crime. So I think there's an issue on resources and how resources have been used. I think secondly, there has also been in some quarters of the police, you know, an issue with politicisation. And I think that has been one of the reasons why there's been operational resistance to take particular decisions. And we've seen that play out on the ground. And so what you're talking about is police painted rainbow colors, people getting arrested for tweets while burglaries go on uninvestigating. Yeah, that sums that.

That doesn't seem to make much sense to the ordinary person, that sort of approach. Yeah, exactly. But the thing is, what I struggle with is, given the type of people that go into policing, I can't imagine there's, you know, a senior police officer who's gone into it to repaint the cars and do all of this arresting people. Like, where's that coming from? So you're right. It's not the rank and file. I don't imagine it is.

No. Exactly. And that's what I always made a point of. I always wanted to meet lower ranking officers. and people who weren't necessary in the leadership positions. And they were very frank with their views to me. And they really resented some of the positions adopted by police chiefs and those in leadership roles. They said it didn't represent them.

It wasn't what they signed up for and it didn't reflect policing. And so the kind of things I became concerned about were, you know, the police taking the knee during the BLM marches, a total expression of a political stance, which was unacceptable. Even when you, particularly when you consider that BLN stands for defunding the police, getting into debates on transgender rights and gender ideology,

some of that can have very damaging consequences for the safety of women. For example, that's played out in some policies that the police have rolled out, now withdrawn actually, because there's been an outcry, on the ability of trans women police officers being able to strip search biologically female suspects. I think that's totally abhorrent and should not be allowed. Really? And the police's guidance said that was permissible.

That's a consequence. Do you have to pinch yourself, Suella? Do you have to pinch yourself when you hear the leader? I mean, I know this sets you up for an easy way to have a go at Keir Stama, but, you know, when we've got this kind of situation, when we've got a guy who's potentially the next prime minister saying he doesn't know what a woman, like all of the stuff, do you ever just go, like, look around and go,

am I in the Truman show here? Well, it's just more, it's terrifying. I'm actually very anxious about it when I hear senior politicians, senior professionals coming out with these views, because it's not just, you know, the culture war, which can get dismissed, but I think it's, it's incredibly dangerous for our society because what it is, is it's like, you know, it's controlling what people should think and say and believe. People have been arrested for saying a man can't be a woman. for stating the basic facts of biology.

That then has a chilling effect on freedom of speech, freedom of belief and freedom of thought, fundamental rights to a democracy and a functioning society. And that is where we're getting into a dystopian, Orwellian kind of world where thoughts speak and the thought police are watching what you're saying and thinking. And I am, you know, this is the tip of the iceberg and this is where it starts.

And so I find it very worrying. And that's why I feel very passionate about speaking up against it. Even if I have to take flack and even if I get demonized for it, I will keep speaking up for the truth because someone has to. And we have to all be brave. And this is what's so great about your show. You are truth tellers and you are courageous in this fight. And we need more people on the media to call.

call out this madness. I'll tell you another damaging effect. Let me ask you something. I'm very happy to hear your criticism. But I think one thing we ought to raise here very much in the spirit of truth-seeking media is that I think all of us believe in free speech. And there has been an issue with the pro-Palestine protests or the protest against what's happening in Israel, where we also see people getting increasingly punished for slogans, opinions they express and so on. Isn't there not a bit of a hypocrisy there from people like us, people like you, in terms of of saying, well, you know, you can't express this opinion because it's, you know, whatever, but these are opinions that must be protected and people should be allowed to.

Where's that line, Soella, how do you draw that line? Right. Well, I think that if we look at the policing of the protests, I think there has been, you know, it's been a very difficult job for the police. There's been hundreds of thousands of people parading on a regular basis. And frankly, the police have been outnumbered. And notwithstanding that, they have made hundreds of people. arrests. But ultimately, three months on, we have the Jewish community totally terrified,

and parts of our big cities have become no-go zones for members of our society, law-abiding members of our society. That is... Which areas are you talking about, in which cities? What are the no-go zones? I would say central London. Central London, approximately once a week now, has become a no-go zone for Jewish people because the hateful marches are taking place as a regular fixture in our diary. And we've seen synagogues having to close. We've seen Jewish people intimidated and harassed

and attacked merely for being Jewish. Now, we've seen a member of parliament being hounded out of office because of anti-Semitism, homophobia and racism. And we all comment, But what is what's happening here? These are all consequences of the phenomenon of mass extremism on our streets. And that's what I believe these marches represented in October.

Widespread anti-Semitism, anti-Semitic chanting, hateful chanting, racism, the chanting of jihad with the police standing by and not just not enforcing against it, but actually coming out with a justification for it. That was a low point for me when I was Home Secretary. An extremist actually having been found to be advising the Metropolitan Police on their strategic board. Free, free! What's going on is global censorship by the Zionists.

Global censorship to silence us. From the river to the sea. From the river to the sea. That's not. From the river to the sea. The police telling the Jewish campaigners not to campaign with their boards, with the pictures of the hostages, pulling down posters of the hostages, there was a double standard. And I think that this needs to be called out.

So when your question is about free speech, of course I will protect the right to freedom of assembly and to peaceful protest and the right to free speech. But when that crosses a line into hate speech, when it becomes racist speech, when it becomes incitement or glorification of some of the most atrocious terrorist acts that we've seen in a generation, that is where the criminal threshold is met, I believe, and where the police should have stepped in. I mean, Suwe, the police could quite, I think it's not a bad argument, actually, to go, look, there's literally thousands of people on this street. and we're having to police this

and there's hundreds of them chanting whatever it is that they're chanting an anti-Semitic chant. Do you expect me to go and arrest all these hundreds of people? I can't do that. That is simply not practical. And if you want me to do that, we need more police officers and we need more resources to make that happen.

Yeah, well that is, and I would say to that, that is precisely what the police's job is to take on the mob, to take on the extremists. They are trained and they are the professionals designed and in place and paid to do that. And if it's about resource, we can fix that. And so I think there's another problem here about police tactics. I think there has been a timidity on the part of the police to take on the mob.

You know, I think there's been a slight fear, a reticence, a reluctance, definitely, to actually jump into the crowd. yes, a calculation needs to be made, is that going to potentially cause a riot? But I do think that you need to equip the police with the right equipment, the right tactics, the right resource. Many of these things they have within their possession and they are able to use these resources to enable better crowd control and to manage hateful extremism on our streets. I think that we have to revisit police tactics of public protests because something's not working. Do you think that failure to deal with the, you know, look, we did a video. I went along to some of these protests recently.

I didn't really see anything. I mean, from the river to the sea is a debate we can have. But apart from that, there was no hate. I'm sort of publicly from a Jewish background. Nobody was attacking me. It didn't feel like I was in a hateful place on the recent ones. But we also have seen some terrible things as part of these protests. Do you think the failure to stamp out that extremism right at the beginning,

the calls for jihad and all of that, and the police actually, as you say, making excuses, encourage the extremists within those crowd to then come out week after week after week, and they fell emboldened by that failure? Yes, I do. And I think looking back, a tougher approach should have been taken at the outset when people were skisking.

scaling scaffolding. They were scaling war memorials. They were wearing masks. They were, they were attacking other counter-protesters like Jewish people in the area. They were using flares and fireworks as weapons. There was violence and there was aggression. So I think that there's been, I think that reluctance has meant that this has continued far longer than it would have. And there's been more people and more intimidation. and more anti-Semitism, which has effectively become normalized. And I think had a tougher approach been taken, things might be different today. So, for example, on Armistice Day, you know, I believe that march should not have gone ahead on Armistice Day.

There had been many, many marches in the run-up. There were going to be marches subsequently, I think, on Armistice Day, a day of deep reverence in Britain, reflecting and remembering our war heroes. I think that march should not have gone ahead. And I think there was a risk of violence. There was a risk of serious disruption. I do think the police took the wrong decision on that. I do think there needs to be a change in the law

to allow a minister to make a decision like that when there is a disagreement. Because I do think that was the wrong thing to do. It provoked counter-protest, and there was ensuing disruption on Whitehall. Let me ask you about that, because ultimately you're no longer Home Secretary, partly because you made this very point,

and you say it provoked counter-protest. You were accused of provoking the counter-protest by making this point. People said the reason that these people came out, most of them who I think were basically football hooligans who came out to protest against the marches that they had seen previously. They were blamed on you. It was you that inflamed tensions.

It was you that incited them to come out. you were this heroine of these people. What do you make of those accusations? Well, I mean, I think that's total nonsense because as Home Secretary, you know, I think you've got a duty to speak up when there's an issue of particular salience relating to policing.

And for a Home Secretary to remain silent and not said anything, I think would have been unacceptable, actually. during these marches. So, you know, as Home Secretary, I set out to support the police, do everything within my power to make their lives easier and empower them,

and also speak up for the British people as truthfully as I could. And I felt that there had been a failure overall in terms of the approach that police had taken towards these marches, such that anti-Semitism has now reached unprecedented levels, we have hundreds of thousands of people marching in a hateful way on a regular basis. Now, I'm not saying that everybody on these marches is violent or a criminal.

What I am saying is that these marches have been, have cultivated this environment. And I think there are many people who are involved in these marches, who attend these marches, who are causing a lot of the criminal behaviour, the disruption, the anti-Semitism, the racism, the extremism. And I think that, you know, we still see, we still see flags being waived, which are supportive of terrorist organisations. We are seeing people glorify some of the events of October the 7th. I think that that is all horrific and odious behaviour. And I do think that there needs to be a more robust approach taken by law enforcement and ministers in terms of keeping, maintaining the peace and keeping public order within our country.

Soella, we're coming to the end of our interview. Thank you so much. Our final question is always the same. So one thing that we should be talking about as a society that we're not. Before Soella answers, make sure that once the interview is over, you head on over to our locals page

and the link is in the description to see this. The Labour Party is totally taken over by extremists. Do you want to be leader of the Conservative Party? Oh my goodness. Don't give me a politician's answer, because we both know your party, to put it very bluntly, is screwed. The one thing I think that we're not talking about, I think, is what is happening to the fabric of our country. And I am very interested in demographic change caused by the pace of migration and the rapid alteration.

of many towns and cities in our country and why we need to start talking about why we are not able to produce this cohesive society which can unite behind a set of inspiring British values. Why are we living in a country where there are ghettos? There are people who are not living and subscribing to British values. Why do we have many people here

who loathe our country and want to see the destruction of Western civilization. Why are the authorities appeasing this sentiment? Why are they turning a blind eye to this kind of behaviour? And how do we empower our authorities, whether that's the police, the universities, the councils, politicians to be more courageous and standing up to extremism, racism and division in our society? What are British Valies? British values, I believe, are respect, the rule of law, democratic, a democratic society, fairness.

I think those are, you know, our monarchy believing in having a level of patriotism and sense of unity. We're a country, we are a multi-ethnic, a multi-faith country, but we also do need to ensure that minority groups subscribe to. a unifying view of what it is to be British and what's made this country great in the past. And I think we need to revisit that and check whether that's working and what can be done to improve it. Zuella, thanks for coming on.

Follow us over to locals where we are, Suella, a few of your questions. Quite a lot of people who historically have voted conservative are simply not going to vote. Because what's the point? how are you going to get people to vote, let alone vote for you, but a vote? This episode is brought to you by Netflix's remarkably bright creatures. What if a Pacific octopus held the key to a mystery that could heal your heart?

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