No Confidence in Her Majesty’s Government

Alison Thewliss Excerpts

Wednesday 16th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I have no confidence in this Government and I never have done. I have no confidence because of how the Department for Work and Pensions treats people. I have no confidence because of the constituent who was sanctioned because they were visiting their dying father. I have no confidence because another constituent was sanctioned while waiting to start a job with the DWP. I have no confidence because of the way people on the personal independence payment are treated. I have no confidence because of how the two-child policy and the rape clause have been pursued against vulnerable women in our society: they must be scrapped. I have no confidence because of the closure of Glasgow’s jobcentres.

I have no confidence in the Government because of the implementation of the hostile environment, with refugees having been left waiting and constituents unable to be with their families. I have no confidence because of the constituent who lost out on his wife’s visa because he was £7 under the threshold. I have no confidence in the Government because of the good character test that is being applied to children, some of whom cannot get citizenship because the Government think they are not of good enough character. While speaking of good character, I have no confidence in the Government because the Home Office told my constituent that he could not get citizenship because he had volunteered with the Red Cross and that that was a sign of bad character. I have no confidence in the Government because of their pursuance of section 322(5) of the immigration rules, whereby people have lost out on leave to remain because they had made a legitimate change to their tax returns that the Government thought was somehow wrong.

I have no confidence in the Government because of their abject failure to deal with Scottish limited partnerships and to reform Companies House. It is almost as if they like money laundering in this country. I have no confidence in the Government because of their refusal, despite all the evidence, to allow Glasgow to pursue supervised drug consumption rooms. It is expected that drug deaths in Scotland will top 1,000 this coming year, but the Government refuse to act for ideological reasons, so I have absolutely no confidence in them.

I have no confidence in the Government because they fail to realise that young people deserve a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. They think that under-25s are not worth the same when they go out to work. This pretendy living wage fails to give people the dignity in work that they deserve.

I have no confidence in the Government because of their failure to tackle the real and present danger that Brexit will cause to all our constituents. They have put their head in the sand and are refusing to accept that the single market and the customs union are the best way forward.

I do have confidence in the people of my constituency. I have confidence in the people of Glasgow and the people of Scotland who voted for independence with such hope in 2014, and I know that when Scotland gets its chance again it will have no confidence in this Government and lots of confidence in itself.