Safe Streets for All

Anne McLaughlin Excerpts

Monday 17th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow North East) (SNP) [V]]

I want people out there to know that being an MP does not stop that feeling of utter despair at times, and that is the best way to describe how I feel when I look at what the UK Home Office has planned. Much of it will not impact on me personally, particularly while I am elected, but it still affects me personally, because like so many people, I find it almost unbearable to live under a Government who care so little about people’s civil liberties; who care even less about the human rights of people who come to us desperate for refuge; and who, instead of celebrating different cultures and ways of life, punish those who are simply trying to live those lives.

It is, however, possible to take a human rights approach and actually mean it. There are political parties that people can believe in. In Scotland, refugees and 16 and 17-year-olds can now vote. We are opening voting up to more people. This Tory Government will require people to have photographic ID or lose their vote. Barriers and voter suppression are not what we expect from the so-called bastion of democracy.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will allow vehicles to be confiscated from Gypsy Travellers for pretty minor offences in England and Wales, even if the vehicle is their home. In Scotland, we produced an action plan in conjunction with Traveller communities, and in case the Home Secretary is wondering, the purpose is to improve lives.

In the UK, there will be longer jail terms for those who topple statues honouring chattel slave owners than for those subjecting other human beings to modern-day slavery. Under the SNP, a move away from soft versus hard justice and a focus on smart justice has led to Scotland having the lowest reconviction rates in 21 years.

The SNP will shortly establish a new £100 million fund to focus on the prevention of violence against women and girls. I ask for the umpteenth time: when are this Government going to ratify the Istanbul convention? On that note, as Labour colleagues have asked, when is the review by the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) going to be implemented?

Of course, our two Governments see things very differently. The shameful dawn raids that have started again in Glasgow shone a light on the difference between callous and compassionate government. I thank the peaceful, sober and tidy people of Pollokshields for the way in which they conducted themselves as they showed two of their neighbours that they are welcome in Scotland. I echo the condemnation that we have heard of antisemitism and all forms of racism and discrimination, including Islamophobia and anti-Catholicism, which have never gone away but have reared their truly ugly heads again recently.

I abhor the plans to clamp down on people peacefully demonstrating. The right to do so is a cornerstone of any democracy. I may not need to demonstrate outside the UK Parliament, because I can speak my mind inside, and I plan to stop being an MP only when Scotland is independent and we therefore have no need to demonstrate in England. But even if independence was happening next week, I would not leave this Parliament without fighting for the right of every person on these islands to protest. Right now, the people of Scotland must have the right to protest policies that impact on their lives over which we have no control, and we must be allowed to protest at the seat of power, and that means this Parliament.

I end by paying tribute to the Women Against State Pension Inequality campaigners, who are to be banned from doing as they did so brilliantly, so eloquently and so peacefully before the pandemic—that is, demonstrating across the road in Parliament Square. They came here to get support and they got it. They came here to raise awareness and they did. They came here to be seen and heard, and they were, but if this legislation goes through and the proposed exclusion zone is brought in, they can come here no more—to their Parliament to protest their Government to protect their rights—and that is all kinds of wrong.