Why she still faces battle to survive in department full of danger

PRITI Patel is set to survive the extraordinary Home Office bullying row – for now. But she is wounded. Boris Johnson’s decision to make a public show of support for the Home Secretary means that the howls of protest from Labour about the need for an inquiry will come to nothing.

Sir Philip Rutnam is also likely to be disappointed if he thought the political hand grenade he lobbed at his former boss would produce an immediate casualty. The Prime Minister was crystal clear last night that he believes Miss Patel to be a ‘fantastic Home Secretary’, despite Sir Philip’s description of her as a liar and a bully only a day earlier. But the PM’s intervention is far from the final word in a saga that has been rumbling away for months and which looks unlikely to end with Sir Philip’s departure. One senior Tory MP was gleefully telling colleagues last week that he had ‘opened a book on whether Priti Patel or Dominic Cummings is first out of the door’ – and predicted both would go this year. Miss Patel now faces an uphill battle to win back the trust of officials as she tries to push ahead with a major new immigration system, a crackdown on serious crime, and the recruitment of 20,000 new police officers – all key pledges in the PM’s election manifesto – as well as overseeing efforts to counter terrorism. If she can deliver on that then she will survive, whatever her grumbling officials might want. BUT the sprawling Home Office has long been known as a political graveyard, and even supporters are worried that Miss Patel may be tripped up by officials loyal to Sir Philip in the coming months.

‘Priti’s problem now is that she doesn’t know who she can trust,’ said one. ‘The Home Office is full of man traps and the worry is that officials will just let her stumble in to one and then make sure everyone knows about it.’

Friends are also surprised by Downing Street’s attitude. There are tensions between Miss Patel and members of the PM’s team, including rumours of rows behind the scenes.

Despite Mr Johnson’s public show of support yesterday, No 10 has quietly removed two of the Home Secretary’s closest aides in recent months. In their place she has been sent a new policy adviser, Michael Young, who is a close ally of Mr Cummings, the PM’s chief adviser. Mr Cummings is said to have told him: ‘You have one job – make sure that Priti doesn’t f*** up the borders.’

It is hardly the greatest display of confidence, although No 10 sources were last night quick to praise Miss Patel’s performance last month in launching the new points-based immigration system.

On top of that, Miss Patel still faces potential complaints of bullying from Home Office staff. Sir Philip accused her of ‘shouting and swearing, belittling people, making unreasonable and repeated demands’. Several of her alleged victims are still at the Home Office.

Yesterday there were fresh claims of a complaint about her conduct while she was a minister at the Department for Work and Pensions. Supporters insist that Sir Philip’s extraordinary allegations were a long way over the top – and some suggest they have sexist overtones. There have been plenty of abrasive male ministers over the years, but no permanent secretary has ever felt the need to respond like

Sir Philip. Few deny that Miss Patel’s ‘determined’ style can be too bracing for some officials. But they say she has been given the task of pushing through major policies in a department that has not covered itself in glory in recent years. ONE former official pointed out that Sir Philip also had a difficult relationship with Amber Rudd, who lost her job over the Windrush scandal while he kept his.

‘To fall out with Amber and Priti should tell you all you need to know about him,’ the source said. ‘He never seems to stop scheming. If Priti had gone, he’d have been unhappy with whoever was appointed.’

But the tensions at the Home Office are not unique. The new government is rubbing up against officialdom in a string of departments, including the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defence, where the permanent secretaries are also said to be targeted by Mr Cummings and his allies.

Sir Philip’s very public intervention seemed to be a very deliberate attempt to reassert the civil service’s independence.

Few in Whitehall expect him to follow through with his threat to sue the Government – a process that could prove embarrassing for all sides.

But his parting blast has made it harder for those seeking to curb the power of the Whitehall mandarins.