the day after the deadline: can the union survive brexit and other deep questions

It might have been better for the Home Secretary to lose her seat in a GE, which seemd likely, but there's lots of harm she could do before then.

June 2017:
Amber Rudd stands in for Theresa May by taking part in the leaders debate instead of her.

April 2018:
Amber Rudd stands in for Theresa May by resigning over the hostile environment fiasco instead of her.

— David Schneider (@davidschneider) April 29, 2018

The way May treats her proteges tells me she might have trampled on more than just some wheat when she was a kid.

Key difference between Rudd and other Tory rebels Soubry, Grieve and co: she has been in Brexit war-Cabinet meetings and knows exactly where the government stands on big issues — e.g customs union. Could be very handy intelligence for the backbenchers and very dangerous for May.

— Adam Payne (@adampayne26) April 29, 2018

this seems to make sense.

lol, was just googling her departed father Tony Rudd and an image of Hugh Grant in 4 weddings appears next to his name in the box on the right.

Best comment BTL at Guardian live blog (poor Andrew Sparrow):

Don't think of it as getting the sack, Amber. Think of it as being removed because of irregularities with your paperwork.

There's something more than a little distasteful about the way commentators are immediately trying to tie this back to Brexit machinations but nothing I've seen about Amber Rudd suggests she's the type to rock the boat on these things.

John Rentoul calling Amber Rudd ‘liberal’ on BBC News channel for calling it a ‘compliant’ environment rather than ‘hostile’. FFS.

"nothing I've seen about Amber Rudd suggests she's the type to rock the boat on these things"

why have you seen Amber Rudd been asked to front for May's shite manifesto 2 days after her dad died, and then a year later coldly used as a human shield/lightning rod and then thrown under a bus, previously?

this 'Rudd is actually a secret liberal' line seems remarkably hardy despite everything

Laura Kuenssberg@bbclaurak

3. Rudd will be powerful Remain voice on backbenches - and only a small number in Cabinet who are close to May's view on immigration - suggested part of Rudd's problem was she delegated too much because she wasn't really behind the overall thrust of policy

I accept that May is more of a hardliner on this than pretty much any other senior tory, but even if you took May out of the question there would still be huge pressure for any politician to take a strongly anti-immigrant line, especially a tory pol, and I can't see any evidence that Rudd would have resisted this pressure even if she were PM herself, or if May wasn't about, or in any other hypothetical situation really

a lot of liberal/centrist pundits seem to have been rooting for Rudd to some extent because she was their preferred choice to take over from May as PM (or maybe even to be part of that New Centrist Party everyone's hoping for), and her resignation makes it more likely that the next election will be a choice between a brexiteer from the right of the Conservative party and Corbyn, neither of which has much appeal for them - is that a correct reading?

Qwhite interesting to see all the pundits trying to assign Yvette Cooper credit for this scalp.

Oh no, I just had a thought: what if Jo Johnson gets the gig?

There's just no way that's going to happen for many obvious reasons.

Do you mean the Toby Young business? It would really piss Boris off (May hates him) and he wouldn’t be able to resign, plus it would hurt AG’s ability to carry on reporting the story. It’s either him or Javid or a Remainer woman I haven’t worked out yet.

It’s Sajid Javid.

see, the tories can't be racist! they've just appointed an asian guy as home secretary!

I bet the decision was already made before that fortuitously timed Telegraph piece yesterday.

Too many people gleefully celebrating the Home Secretary’s resignation are doing us no favours. Inhumanity creates a destructive, sour political culture that spills over into policy and makes victims of the powerless, including migrants. It offers no future for them or the left

— Lisa Nandy (@lisanandy) April 30, 2018

Lisa Nandy is saying if ppl were nicer to right wing politicos ...erm wtf is she saying?

if we're mean to politicians they'll take their anger out on the powerless?

charming.

this really is bizarre, were there this many Labour MPs coming out to bat for Fallon, Patel and Green?

pray 4 Rudd

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/19/home-secretary-courts-amber-rudd-deport-samim-bigzad Love too stick up for this kind of humanity.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/19/home-secretary-courts-amber-rudd-deport-samim-bigzad Love too stick up for this kind of humanity.

And double post, apparently...

Who is she even targeting with that tweet? Journalists? Labour supporters? Response from labour itself has been measured and pretty calm - nobody is out there calling Rudd a monster or whatever.

I am trying to parse this, but nope, not a clue. Why are so many politicians apparently not even aware of the scale of misery and suffering felt by people like immigrants, the disabled, the poor? Or are they aware and don't care? Whichever it is, seems like a particularly idiotic move on Nandy's part.

She's aware, she's just pointing out that the cycle of abuse starts with a single tweet. And a time machine.

John Woodcock and Jess Phillips defending her makes more sense in that Woodcock's politics are probably closer to Rudd's than they are to many of his own colleagues, and Phillips presents herself as a non-partisan maverick, but Nandy is one of the more left-leaning of members of the PLP?

A whole lot of Labour MP's were making lots of tough on immigration noises back before the 2015 election, so perhaps some of them know they lack the moral authority to attack Rudd, and are just not quite the same type of stone cold hypocrite that Cooper is.

So is Javid going to get straight to his #1 goal of shutting down "neo-fascist group" Momentum now or?

AYO

Walking into Parliament this morning pic.twitter.com/P5pDVxPRXx

— David Lammy (@DavidLammy) April 30, 2018

xxp I don’t think it’s likely to be the case with Nandy, she is progressive on immigration. And she is still left wing - though amusingly her Dad, an Indian Marxist who founded the Runnymede Trust, thinks she’s right wing.

Subtweet gone wrong?

a man of principle!

A former investment banker and Margaret Thatcher devotee, Javid’s instincts are on the right of the party. His appointment will keep the technical balance of EU leavers and remainers in the top offices, but only just. Javid backed remain in the referendum, but with some hesitation and probably under pressure from David Cameron. He has since swung behind leavers in the cabinet.

a supporter of women!

His other hero apart from Thatcher is Ayn Rand – he recounted once that he regularly rereads the courtroom scene from her novel The Fountainhead, telling the Spectator he admired its description of “the power of the individual … sticking up for your beliefs, against popular opinion”.

a man of his word!

His biggest challenge in the brief, however, has been the Grenfell Tower disaster, where the government has faced mounting criticism for stalling on promises to the victims’ families. He admitted just weeks ago the government was likely to break its promise to permanently rehouse within a year all those made homeless.

Nandy was one of them heroes who often speaks out against austerity, but abstained on the Welfare Reform vote where more than words were needed, which is totally dud imo.

they're gonna take that shotgun off Lammy surely?

Does that mean tory party is gonna send hoods to torture Lammy's partner to death/frame him for a murder to try and get him killed in prison

well, yeah

He'll survive all that, but end up getting shot for no reason in a convenience store by some no mark kid (Tim Farron)

Nandy was a shadow minister at the time and breaking the whip would have meant being sacked. May have reasoned it was better to stay in the shadow cabinet rather than be a backbencher without any voice.

which just goes to show what a fine vintage McDonnell is and why about 90% of this lot are utter waste!

lol at all the self-described opponents of PC who are in Lammy's replies being very, very offended by his tweeting that picture (especially the guy trying to grass him up to @metpoliceuk, apparently non-ironically)

pic.twitter.com/kb8z3RWF9G

— Ricardo Autobahn (@ricardoautobahn) April 30, 2018

lol!

Theresa May visited a junior school in Trafford today. Children were selected by staff to meet with her and those unlucky few were instructed not to mention recent political events or Jeremy Corbyn.
The Prime Minister is now scared of school children.

— Old Git (@toooldforit) April 30, 2018

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/labour-mp-john-woodcock-suspended-from-party-pending-sex-harassment-investigation_uk_5ae74b37e4b02baed1bce7e5

whoah! Woodcock suspended and whip has been withdrawn sexual harassment.

It’s a fairly standard thing now - the Tories gave Charlie Elphicke suspended since November and Labour also withdrew the whip from Kelvin Hopkins around the same time.

lots of people on twitter arguing about whether Javid being the first BME home sec means there's a chance of a more liberal immigration policy - it seems like he's very right wing and enthusiastic about brexit, but less in a Theresa May, nativist, back-to-the-1950s way and more in a free-marketeer, "let's turn Britain into Singapore" way that isn't necessarily hostile to immigration? But then, Rudd's alleged personal liberalism didn't seem to have much impact on home office policy, so I guess it might not matter so much what he believes. Does May's weakened position mean that it may be possible to push back against her instincts on immigration though?

Incredibly naive of people to think that. Plus he had the following words for Diane Abbott, so...

Sajid Javid to Diane Abbott on #Windrush: “I am a second generation migrant too. She doesn’t have a monopoly on anger”.

— Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) April 30, 2018

I read that Javid isn't much of a "details person", he might need to work on that a bit.