Suella Braverman has been sacked as Home Secretary as Rishi Sunak begins a reshuffle of his Cabinet.
A government spokesman said on Monday morning: “Rishi Sunak has asked Suella Braverman to leave government and she has accepted.”
Mrs Braverman said: “It has been the greatest privilege of my life to serve as Home Secretary. I will have more to say in due course.”
The Home Secretary’s position had been under pressure since last week when she wrote an unauthorised article in which she criticised the Metropolitan Police for a “double standard” over their handling of protests.
She also attacked “pro-Palestinian mobs” and said protest scenes were “disturbingly reminiscent” to those seen in Northern Ireland.
Mrs Braverman was accused by some of exacerbating tensions and for some of the extreme-Right violence seen at Saturday’s Armistice Day events in Whitehall.
Downing Street said the day after the article was published that it had not been signed off, raising questions over the Home Secretary’s position.
Sir Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat leader, said: “Suella Braverman was never fit to be Home Secretary. Rishi Sunak knew this and he still appointed her.
“It was the Prime Minister’s sheer cowardice that kept her in the job even for this long. We are witnessing a broken party and a broken government, both of which are breaking this country.
“This whole sorry saga has shown the Conservative party for what they truly are.
“An unruly mob more focussed on fighting and undermining each other rather than standing up for their constituents and fixing the country that they have broken.
“They need to put us all out of our misery and call a general election now.”
Mrs Braverman was appointed Home Secretary by Liz Truss but had to resign six weeks later when it emerged she had breached the ministerial code by sharing an official document from her personal email address with a colleague in Parliament.
She was reappointed six days later, by which time Mr Sunak had become prime minister.
The new prime minister said she had “made an error of judgment but she recognised that she raised the matter and she accepted her mistake”.
Mrs Braverman became a highly controversial Home Secretary, facing criticism for using words such as “invasion” to describe illegal immigration.
Earlier this month, she criticised pro-Palestinian marches scheduled for Armistice Day, citing “reports that some of Saturday’s march group organisers have links to terrorist groups, including Hamas”.
That sparked calls for her resignation for “fanning the flames of division”, in the words of Humza Yousaf, the Scottish First Minister.
A No 10 source said: “Suella has gone because the Prime Minister wants a united team to deliver the changes this country needs for the long term.”
