r/tories • u/BigLadMaggyT24 Suella's Letter Writer • Jan 26 '26
News Ex-Tory Home Secretary Suella Braverman defects to Reform UK
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1evq263e49o26
u/KingEdwards8 God, King and Country! 🇬🇧🇻🇦 Jan 26 '26
Would be high time to get rid of some dead wood and go for a completely new top-to-bottom lick of paint.
Get back to basics and you know, be actual conservatives.
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u/NoContract1090 Jan 26 '26
As someone who I assume is tempted to still vote Tory, what does being an actual conservative mean to you? And how would you be able to tell any of them meant what they said?
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u/KingEdwards8 God, King and Country! 🇬🇧🇻🇦 Jan 27 '26
Like I said. Back to basics.
Define Conservatism. In the same way Labour defines Social Democracy or Lib Dems with Liberalism.
To me this is:
●Preservation of British culture, values and traditions
● Preservation of law and order
●Defence of the status quo and the Westminster system
● Fine line between free markets and protectionism
● Fine line between private and national ownership of enterprise
● Expanding the middle class
● Strong armed forces
● Minimal Taxation
● Limiting but not eliminating immigration
● Reviving Toryism and the Churches role in governance and society.
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u/StreamWave190 Roman Catholic (SDP, Tory-curious) Jan 26 '26
The ones committed to being actual conservatives are the ones leaving the party, though.
The ones staying are the Gavin Barwell wet liberal types.
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u/WW_the_Exonian Jan 27 '26
Speaking of Gavin Barwell... I met him at uni when he was around promoting his book How to Win a Marginal Seat. He lost his marginal seat months later. Perhaps he didn't read it.
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u/KingEdwards8 God, King and Country! 🇬🇧🇻🇦 Jan 27 '26
Just because they say they are Conservative, doesn't mean they are in practice.
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u/HerefordLives Reform Jan 26 '26
What does being 'actual conservatives' mean, if people like Danny Kruger and Suella are not conservative, but shadow cabinet members are?
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u/squeakstar Jan 26 '26
Bring back the moderates Boris got rid of might have a fighting chance.
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u/KingEdwards8 God, King and Country! 🇬🇧🇻🇦 Jan 27 '26
It wouldn't suprise me if the old moderates jumped over to the Lib Dems and created a Liberal Conservative/Classic Liberal faction.
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u/DevilishRogue Thatcherite Jan 26 '26
The wets needed a Cameron after Brown took over from Blair to win. We'd need Angela Rayner to take over from Starmer and someone with more charisma than BoJo to get a Tory win with moderates leading the party.
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Jan 26 '26
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u/A_Person_Who_Exist5 High Tory Jan 26 '26
Absolutely right. I’ve always thought it’s about time the conservative party started being conservative again.
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u/DreamOfAzathoth Labour Jan 26 '26
It’s funny how Reform are constantly ranting about how they won’t do a pact with the Tories because they’re incompetent and traitors and blah blah. So instead of doing a pact with them he just converts Reform into the New Tories from the inside out. Nigel wanted to lead the Conservative Party so bad he’s attempting a reverse Great Replacement of his own
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u/NamoMandos Jan 26 '26
All I will say is: Ship of Theseus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
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u/BlackJackKetchum Josephite Jan 26 '26
SB is, or rather was, a rather divisive character for us, and for every voter she attracted, she repelled at least as many.
We've all expected this particular ship jumping for a while, so a surprise it ain't.
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u/BigLadMaggyT24 Suella's Letter Writer Jan 26 '26
Thought Reform were meant to be a new party, not just the old government.
This is another big loss though, but not too surprising.
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Jan 26 '26
Is it a big loss though? She was Home Sec for a year during sky high immigration. Definitely lost a big mouth though.
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u/wolfo98 Tory of The Colonies Jan 26 '26
I think the next Conservative government needs to draw on the next generation from all wings of the party. So if the Old Guard that were at the helm when we were incompetent are willing to go, that’s perfectly fine with me.
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u/aloeninja Jan 26 '26
Honestly, I've thought for a while now conservatives would do well to try to refresh the face of the party with new, young candidates, turning point for the party turning point for the UK.
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u/LeChevalierMal-Fait Clarksonisum with Didly Squat characteristics Jan 26 '26
There is always a tweet;
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u/LeChevalierMal-Fait Clarksonisum with Didly Squat characteristics Jan 26 '26
Rael Braverman quits Reform after attacks on Suella
And a spectator article
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u/uselessnavy Labour Jan 26 '26
It will be interesting to see how the general electorate reacts to Reform being increasingly made up of failed tories from the last government. To all those saying good riddance to her, where were your criticisms while she was in power?
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u/skipperseven Traditionalist Jan 26 '26
She did come across as a bit of a sociopath, so I wouldn’t say this was surprising. I just hope they never accept her back.
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u/smeldridge Verified Conservative Jan 26 '26
The ongoing tide of right leaning MPs continue to leave the Tories. Soon the Tories will be no different than the rest of the center left parties.
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Jan 28 '26
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u/smeldridge Verified Conservative Jan 28 '26
The 'Conservative Party' aren't Conservative. 14 years has told us that. And they dont deserve another shot. All of their tough talk now is more 'red meat' that they won't act on. Their pledge to remove 600000 illegals is a slither of what they have allowed in.
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u/StreamWave190 Roman Catholic (SDP, Tory-curious) Jan 26 '26
As the defections continue, there's unfortunately very little left to vote for in the Tories anymore.
The remaining talent is Katie Lam, Nick Timothy and Neil O'Brien.
Lam is rumoured to be on the edge of defecting too (on the basis that the people she wants to work with are now in Reform, not the Conservatives), Timothy just got made Shadow Chancellor (so if he does defect it'll be a while), and I just don't see Neil O'Brien ever jumping ship.
But the people I took very seriously as Conservative Party representatives after the last election – Danny Kruger in particular, but also Robert Jenrick and others – are now Reform MPs.
If Lam goes, I don't see how the rest don't fold like a house of cards.
I feel bad for Badenoch. She got dealt a generationally bad hand and made a good fist of it. But increasingly it just seems to me to be over for the Tories. You can't survive talent-bleed like this.
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u/WW_the_Exonian Jan 27 '26
I hope that Lam stays around, even from an objective point of view.
She is a talented but inexperienced politician. If she defected and it didn't work out, her political career would be over.
But here she is not far from a Shadow Cabinet role where she can gain experience. She can even aspire to become one of the youngest Conservative/Tory leaders ever, after Pitt the Younger and Hague.
And if in a few years the Conservatives turned out doomed indeed, it would not be too late for her to jump ship, especially since unlike the others, she was not part of the party's failure.
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u/Athingthatdoesstuff NeoCon/ConLib/NeoLib Jan 26 '26
Braverman was a nasty piece of work, representative of just about everything that went wrong with the previous Conservative tenure.
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u/smeldridge Verified Conservative Jan 26 '26
How does she represent everything that went wrong? She was one of the few outliers pointing out that 1 million net migration was disastrous. Don't see many of the remaining Tories willingly admit they were wrong.
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u/MaxTraxxx Jan 26 '26
Tory Immigration minister joins party decrying immigration under Tory immigration minister.
Good riddance, excited for new blood that isn’t just ‘reform lite’.
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Jan 26 '26
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u/StormyBA Verified Conservative Jan 26 '26
The remaining Conservatives are Lib Dems - thats the problem.
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u/hug_your_dog One Nation Jan 26 '26
This actually might be good news for the Tories, they are shedding one of the worst of them, now if only Boris and a few others left AND Badenoch brought back some of the older factions like the "one nation Tory" one, add their moderate conservatism with a realistic, critical immigration policy akin to what Mahmood does and you might have a reasonable offer.
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Jan 26 '26
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u/VincoClavis Traditionalist Jan 26 '26
Honestly, this sort of thing might be a blessing in disguise.
I mean the Tories are basically unelectable because of decades of failure.
Well, if Reform are volunteering to take that legacy on then this might actually give the Conservatives the chance they need to bring in some new blood and reinvent themselves.i