Business of the House

Deidre Brock Excerpts

Thursday 16th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Deidre Brock (Edinburgh North and Leith) (SNP)]

First, I will take up the Leader of the House on last week’s offer of a deeper briefing with a Minister on what she described as

“some minor issues to resolve”—[Official Report, 9 May 2024; Vol. 749, c. 696.]

in the border operating model. If, as she told me last week, she is paying “great attention” to what is going on and still did not see huge lorries as they wait 20 hours at border posts, perhaps she should take a trip to Barnard Castle. I would like to take the chief executive officer of the Cold Chain Federation, whose members certainly do not agree with her that there are no fundamental issues to sort out, with me to that briefing to deliver a dose of reality.

May we have a debate in Government time on the careful use of words in politics? The Prime Minister has refused to apologise for his offensive outburst on Monday when he quite deliberately associated the Scottish Government with Hamas terrorists, North Korea and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. The good folk of Edinburgh North and Leith have elected a dangerous extremist—who knew?—along with the vast majority of MPs from Scotland who also want independence. All along, we thought that we were democratically elected Members of this House, just like the Leader of the House.

Madam Deputy Speaker, you might think that the Conservatives of Brexit Britain would respect a nation’s right to self-determination as a perfectly honourable political position. Is it just Scotland’s that they do not respect? We will always defend our nation’s best interests. Maybe that is what terrifies the PM and the likes of the Scotland Secretary, who wants to force ruinously expensive, untried nuclear reactors on renewables-rich Scotland. Now, he is frightening our bairns with threats of a Unionist regime and Scottish Labour back in power to push through our overlords’ cunning plans—what a Better Together reunion that would be. Would the Leader of the House remind me what happened to that respect agenda?

It would almost be funny if it were not coming from this particular Government: an unknown number of prisoners let loose around England, the Home Office losing thousands of migrants under its watch, and an English courts and justice system on the verge of collapse. But what is on the Prime Minister’s new hate list? What keeps Tories awake at night with fear? People like me, apparently. How laughable. Could the Leader of the House confirm whether she believes that the Prime Minister was right to associate Scottish democrats with Hamas terrorists and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, or will she take the opportunity to distance herself from this laughably desperate baloney?

[Penny Mordaunt]

Let me first reassure the hon. Lady that, first, there is nothing wrong with my eyesight and, secondly, she does not keep me awake at night. Could I draw her attention to the news this week that the eurozone economy is growing half as fast as Britain? Let me repeat that: the eurozone economy is growing half as fast as Britain. The SNP’s time would be better spent not trying to re-fight past referendums of all types but focusing on the issues today, such as the housing emergency that has just been declared in Scotland due to its rent control policy.

The hon. Lady raised the very serious matter of the Prime Minister’s language. I understand that, thanks to the Scottish Government, people can now fill in a hate report form. If she has any concerns, she can just fill in a report and pile more work on to her hard-pushed police officers.

On the plans to put a nuclear power station in Scotland, it is sensible to plan for a Unionist party to be in government in Scotland. Given the timescales involved in nuclear construction, that is a sensible and pragmatic thing to do. It is clear to everyone, except the SNP, that the party is in its final death throes. I predict that at the tragic finale, when the SNP finally completely implodes and meets its end, there will still be no ferry to carry its members across the Styx.