President Trump: State Visit

Dawn Butler Excerpts

Monday 20th February 2017 Westminster Hall

[Dawn Butler (Brent Central) (Lab)]

I congratulate the Petitions Committee on holding this debate. My constituency is the most diverse in Europe, and I am very proud of that. Almost everybody there has something to say about Trump and America.

The UK has, and always has had, a close working relationship with the United States, and it is important to continue that special relationship, but it comes with responsibilities. Today we speak in our Parliament, which is older than the United States itself, and we have a responsibility—as the elder, if you like—to guide that special relationship. It is often said that when America sneezes, the UK catches a cold. Well, right now America has a pretty nasty virus, and it is important that that virus does not spread. We have to stop the spread of that virus, because the closeness of our special relationship and the open wound we have, which was created by Brexit, leaves us quite vulnerable. We need to stop this contagion becoming an epidemic that leads to a pandemic from which the free world may never recover.

There is a lot of talk about the negotiations the Prime Minister delivered to continue our close working relationship. I say that we cannot sell our souls and what we believe in in order to sell our goods and services. That price is way too high to pay. The antidote to the virus is building bridges, not walls. It is listening to the thousands of people who have spoken, who have signed the petition and who are outside Parliament right now—we can hear them cheering and chanting. We hear people who have come out to march. People who have never marched before are outside Parliament right now because they believe in something. They believe in hope, not hate.

Edmund Burke said,

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

I am sure that he wanted to mention women in his speech and his wise statement. It was women who were the first to mobilise against Trump’s extremism; hundreds of thousands took to the streets, and they were rightly joined by men, boys, girls, those who are gay, straight, people of all religions and those of none. It is time that the United Kingdom united its voice against racism, bigotry, misogyny, Islamophobia, anti-Semitism and all the tools of division that have given Trump the White House. People have said today, “He is not racist, because—”. To me, that is the same as saying, “How can someone be a murderer?” It is the same way as a murderer can be a murderer and still have friends who are alive. It does not matter—he is still a racist and misogynistic.

We affect each other. I think Martin Luther King put it well. He said:

“I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be… this is the interrelated structure of reality.”

We are bound together in a “single garment of destiny” and we need each other in order to move forward. There is no way around it; we have to work with other people.

President Trump is the President. He can come and visit, but not on a state visit—that is taking it a little step too far. Trump’s message is not about togetherness; it is all about building walls and imposing bans. It is not about the truth; when he speaks and someone criticises or questions what he has said, he cries that it is fake news. There is a real issue and a problem that we have to address.

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Mr Andrew Turner (in the Chair)]

Order. We have reached 6.45 pm, so we must move on to Liam Byrne.

[Dawn Butler]

I will conclude to give my right hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Liam Byrne) time to speak. I just want to say that the whole world is watching the decision that we make in Parliament, and we cannot be on the wrong side of history.