Braverman’s bluster

British Home Secretary Suella Braverman continues in her efforts to become the first Indian-origin person to win the backing of white nationalists and xenophobes in the UK, flatly and repeatedly lying about so-called “grooming gangs” and child sexual abuse in general by blaming the problem on Pakistani men who “hold cultural values at odds with British values”. Never mind that in a 2020 report, the department she now heads noted that most grooming gangs are made up of white men. While it is a fact that a few gangs were predominantly Pakistani or composed of other minorities, there is no evidence suggesting minority groups made up a disproportionately high number of sexual abusers.

But although government data and experts say about 84% of child sex offenders are white British, Braverman made no mention of them. This is because Braverman’s entire career is made up of ironic dog whistles: despite being married to a Jew, she has used anti-Semitic language, she is anti-immigrant and regularly uses anti-immigrant rhetoric despite being the child of two Indian immigrants, and she claims to be a hardline law and order minister despite having previously resigned from the same job after being exposed for “multiple breaches of the ministerial code”. In fact, even fellow Conservatives questioned her reappointment by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak without a formal inquiry for setting a “dangerous precedent”. But Sunak — who is also of Indian origin and was previously edged out of a leadership battle by 49-day premier Liz Truss — needs Braverman’s bigotry credentials to maintain the support of xenophobes.

Still, it is unfortunate that Sunak and 10 Downing Street made no effort to push back on the home secretary’s remarks, not even with a slap on the wrist. Instead, a spokesman qualified them by saying Braverman was only talking about “some of these gangs” without “fear of political correctness”, but had no explanation for why the ethnic group responsible for 84% of child sex crimes gets a free pass.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, April 7^th, 2023.

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