Suella Braverman shows her slightly softer side on LBC radio | John Crace

Attention. Do not adjust your radio sets. Normal service will be resumed shortly.

Fair to say that most listeners tuning in to LBC at 10am on Tuesday morning would have been in for a shock. Regular presenter James O’Brien was off on his hols and in his place was Suella Braverman. From the beating heart of liberal Britain to the rightwing dog whistle of the Tory party. And no one sounded more surprised than Suella herself. “James must be having a heart attack,” she said nervously at the start.

Or maybe not. Because the Suella we got was quite different to the one we are accustomed to. I mean, obviously she was wrong on most things – you wouldn’t expect anything else – but this was a far softer Suella. Less noisy, less combative, less unpleasant. Someone who not only made an effort to sound interested in what listeners had to say but at times reached out to meet them halfway. A Suella that has gone unseen for the last eight years.

It made you think. Which is the real Suella? The one that could pick a fight in an empty room. The one who is never happier than when marginalising the most vulnerable groups in society. Or was this only ever an act? A performance to stir up division. Had there always been a caring Suella lying buried inside? Or is she lost to herself entirely? A politician without empathy. Someone who will just give her audiences what she thinks they want.

The first hour was taken up with illegal immigration. Something Braverman considers to be her specialist subject. She began with an apologia. The Tories hadn’t delivered on stopping the boats. But that was Rishi Sunak’s fault. She had tried to put in place the Rwanda plan but had been thwarted at every turn. Her only motivation had been her compassion. A desire to find a better life for people who had been fleeing persecution. Just so long as that better place wasn’t the UK.

Awad from Barnet pointed out that Rwanda wasn’t quite the safe country Suella tried to claim it was. Rwanda had sent death squads over the border into the Congo. The international courts had also declared Rwanda not to be safe. There was that, said the new, improved Suella as someone in the studio held up a sign saying “Try not to insult the audience”. But on the other hand, she had heard of someone who had moved to Rwanda a few years ago who had set up a convenience store. So, on balance, Rwanda was probably safe. Thank you and goodbye, Awad.

Next on the line was Gerald from Whitley Bay. He couldn’t believe his good luck that James was away for the week and wasted no time in telling Suella she was spot on. We just needed to send all the asylum seekers back to France. Brilliant idea, Suella agreed. She couldn’t understand why so many EU countries were making life so much more difficult for the UK after we voted for Brexit. After all, Brexit was supposed to help us take back control. Just no one told the EU.

Other callers pointed out that Suella had always known the Rwanda plan had only ever been an unworkable gimmick and that leaving the European convention on human rights would make us an international pariah. Braverman thanked them profusely for their contributions and observed that illegal migration was a much more complex problem than many people think. No shit. Suella included. She also insisted that it was perfectly OK to have an opinion on something even if you don’t know what you are talking about. It was her mantra as home secretary, after all.

For the second hour, Braverman wanted to talk about the US presidential election. Having returned from the “alt-right” National Conservatism conference in Washington a couple of weeks ago, she now considers herself to be a world expert on US politics.

“Let me get the ball rolling,” she said. “If I was an American I would be voting for Donald Trump.” Kamala Harris was just a dangerous, ineffectual lefty while the Donald could be guaranteed to end all wars in an instant. It was as if Suella had just swallowed a stupidity pill and was merely repeating back what Trump had said at the Republican convention.

Unsurprisingly almost no one agreed with Braverman. One by one the counter arguments came in. What about the fact Trump was a proven liar and a sexual abuser? What about the fact that he had been found guilty of 34 felony counts? What about the fact that he had instigated the riot on Capitol Hill by claiming the election had been rigged? What about his support for Putin?

“Ah yes,” said Suella. There was all this. But really the election was about forgetting all the bad stuff and just concentrating on the fact that the Donald was at heart the perfect role model. At the very least, he could be trusted not to do anything on the climate crisis. I guess that clinches it.

Moving on. We ended with a conversation on the future direction of the Tory party. Here Suella appeared to have undergone a personality change. Only on Monday she had been screaming from the roof tops not to send the Conservatives down the dead end street of the ‘One Nation cranks’. Now her language was far more moderate. So much so that she didn’t think to mention that she was planning to run for the leadership herself. Or maybe someone has had a word with her.

Suella began with her own diagnosis of the problem. The Tories had drifted too far to the centre, she said. The idea that after 14 years of everything getting steadily worse, the country might have had enough had not occurred to her. Nor that people might not be so forgiving of Boris Johnson’s lies and parties or Liz Truss’s kamikaze budget. It was the selective memory of a halfwit. The lurch to the right of Reform. Or as Braverman would put it. The move to the middle ground.

Then the surprise. “I believe in compassion and fairness,” she said to a trans caller. “Live and let live. Everyone deserves to feel safe.” Words no one had ever heard her speak before. She sounded like someone who cared. Close your eyes and she could have been James O’Brien himself. A paid up member of the Wokerati. Rachel didn’t believe her. You’re just a scaremonger, she said. Suella didn’t give up. “Are you getting the support you need?”

That just left enough time for a couple of callers to say the Conservatives were dead in the water and should merge with Reform, before Ross phoned in to ask where former Tories like him who believed in international law and being nice to people were supposed to go. Suella shrugged. The Lib Dems perhaps.