UK Prime Minister Liz Truss in crisis as Home Secretary Suella Braverman quits and blasts her leadership

Liz Truss’ house of cards looked on the brink of collapse this morning after her Home Secretary Suella Braverman resigned.

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Liz Truss’ house of cards looked on the brink of collapse this morning after her Home Secretary quit her Cabinet - and blasted her on the way out.

In a blistering resignation letter, Suella Braverman slammed the PM and said she had “serious concerns” about the “direction of this government”.

“It is obvious to everyone that we are going through a tumultuous time,” Ms Braverman wrote.

“I have concerns about the direction of this government. Not only have we broken key pledges that were promised to our voters, but I have serious concerns about this government’s commitment to honouring manifesto commitments.”

Ms Braverman’s letter suggests she had earlier told Ms Truss that she had sent an official document to an MP from her personal email account - in breach of Cabinet rules.

She wrote that this was a “mistake” that she must take responsibility for.

In a thinly-veiled dig at Ms Truss’ disastrous start as Prime Minister, she continued: “Pretending we haven’t made mistakes, carrying on as if everyone can’t see that we have made them, and hoping things will magically come right is not serious politics.

“I have made a mistake; I accept responsibility; I resign.”

Ms Braverman is the second key minister to leave the government in as many weeks, after Ms Truss sacked her former Chancellor (finance minister) Kwasi Kwarteng last Friday.

British Prime Minister Liz Truss (Photo by Alastair Grant – Pool/Getty Images)

Suella Braverman has resigned as Home Secretary. (Photo by ADRIAN DENNIS / AFP)

The Home Secretary’s resignation came hours after Ms Truss pulled out of a visit to a factory, raising questions about whether she was facing another crisis.

And those suspicions were confirmed late on Wednesday afternoon (1.30am Thursday AEDT), when it was confirmed Ms Braverman, who has only been in the job for five weeks, had quit.

It’s understood that Ms Truss took Ms Braverman aside in the House of Commons after Prime Minister’s Questions to tell her to resign.

Former transport secretary Grant Shapps is expected to replace her.

Ms Braverman had spoken out against Ms Truss’ U-turn on cutting tax for Britain’s highest earners, saying the PM had fallen victim to a “coup”.

The PM was forced to ditch the pledge to drop the top rate of tax after a combination of pressures from the markets and political fallout.

She eventually dropped all of her and Mr Kwarteng’s ‘mini-Budget’ – which included £45 billion (A$80.6 billion) in unfunded tax reforms and a massively costly scheme to protect families from soaring energy bills – after the policies sent the markets into free fall and saw mortgage rates surge.

My letter to the Prime Minister. pic.twitter.com/TaWO1PMOF2

— Suella Braverman MP (@SuellaBraverman) October 19, 2022

Ms Truss sacked Mr Kwarteng in an attempt to save her own political career, replacing him with new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt.

Mr Hunt has since set about reversing essentially all of Ms Truss’ economic policy, raising the question of who is really running the government.

Several of the Prime Minister’s own MPs have called on her to quit but she has stood firm and has vowed to lead the Conservative Party into the next election. They are currently nearly 30 points behind the Opposition Labour Party – a record low.

Ms Truss only came to power last month after winning a leadership contest sparked by the resignation of Boris Johnson.

Because she has only just assumed office, under current party rules, she cannot face a leadership challenge for the next 11 months.

However, it has been suggested that the rules could be rewritten to force her out, or her Cabinet could revolt and demand she quits.

It is not clear who would take over in such a scenario, but the favourites are former Chancellor Rishi Sunak, Leader of the House of Commons Penny Mordaunt and Defence Secretary Ben Wallace.