Gavin Williamson’s resignation sets another record for this chaotic regime

A little over three months ago, during the last but one Conservative leadership campaign, Rishi Sunak declared that appointing a new independent ethics adviser would be “one of the first things” he did in government if he won the race to succeed Boris Johnson in No 10. For obvious reasons, it must be said.

Mr Sunak had resigned as chancellor, effectively ending Mr Johnson’s premiership, because, in his own words: “The public rightly expect government to be conducted properly, competently and seriously. I recognise this may be my last ministerial job, but I believe these standards are worth fighting for and that is why I am resigning.”

Mr Sunak was right, and must now be regretting that he hasn’t yet appointed an ethics adviser – or even, as he himself suggested in July, brought back Lord Geidt, who had quit the job in protest in June (though perhaps Lord Geidt, who’d served the Queen as private secretary for some years, had had enough of politicians).

How handy it would be for Mr Sunak to be able to call upon a distinguished and respected adviser to help him out of the mess some of his freshly reappointed ministers have landed him in. The many and varied allegations about Gavin Williamson, for example, would have been duly weighed and sifted, and some judicious conclusion arrived at for the consideration of the prime minister. Instead, Mr Williamson has been forced to quit after a series of increasingly unsavoury allegations, in the messiest way possible. He was a minister, absurdly, for national security for a matter of hours. Another record for this chaotic regime.

The same goes for his hapless and over-promoted home secretary, Suella Braverman. Ms Braverman is not even minimally competent in her current role, her wilfulness and vaulting ambition getting the better of her legal expertise and political judgement.

She was required to resign once, by Liz Truss, for breaking the ministerial code and it now appears she may have broken it on many more occasions. She has not, it appears, properly considered legal advice about her policies, nor cared very much about her legal obligations towards the inmates at the Manston migrant centre.

The charge that she deliberately detained people in the centre rather than move them on, in squalid conditions and contrary to law, is a serious one. It is one that might have been settled by the independent adviser on ministerial standards, in a quasi-judicial manner, and Mr Sunak would be rid of his troublesome minister.

Yet perhaps Mr Sunak would rather not be rid of her because she is politically useful. Hence her miraculous resurrection and survival.

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The prime minister is only too well aware that he and his chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, have some very difficult battles ahead of them with their own still-restive backbenchers, many of whom think Liz Truss was actually right about economics – and pine for the days of Johnsonian cakeism. They are opposed to tax hikes, but also hostile to most spending cuts – and disapprove of borrowing. They are a difficult audience, to say the least, and Mr Sunak will need all the help he can get to push his autumn statement through the Commons after 17 November.

The last thing he needs is Ms Braverman fomenting trouble for him on the backbenches and plotting in the tea rooms and the bars of the Palace of Westminster. After he gets his autumn statement through, he can contemplate a mini-reshuffle.

No one, not even Mr Sunak, pretends that Ms Braverman and the now departed Mr Williamson conform to the lofty ideals he set out in Downing Street on his first day in office: “This government will have integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level.”

But for now, at least, he and we will have to put up with Ms Braverman. After the third fall of Mr Williamson, however, she is looking a little less secure.