Cost of Living in Scotland

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[David Linden]

Absolutely. The hon. Gentleman is spot on. Of course, he previously served in the devolved Parliament in Scotland, where there is responsibility for health policy. One thing that he and I would share a concern about is that, as a result of some of those decisions around poverty, we find that there is a knock-on effect for many of our constituents. If someone is living in fuel poverty, that has an impact on their health, which in turn has an impact on other aspects such as employment; all of these decisions are linked up. That is a pressure that our colleagues in Scotland face.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful speech. Does he feel, as I do, that the Tory Government here in Westminster have absolutely forgotten disabled people? They announced a social energy tariff consultation, which has not happened. Many people across these isles, and especially those with disabilities, cannot afford to heat their homes.

[David Linden]

Absolutely. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who I know does a power of work on this issue and is an active member of the Lanarkshire forum on poverty. She is right. We know that there is evidence suggesting that people with a disability experience £950 a month more living costs, not to mention the fact that the UK Government so cruelly overlooked the 2.5 million legacy benefit claimants during the pandemic, who did not get their £20 uplift.

I know that my hon. Friend did not see my speech in advance, but she touched on a point that I want to come to next, which is about the impact on physical and mental health. That is an issue that impacts people across all of these islands. Indeed, the Mental Health Foundation found that almost one third of Scottish adults reported feeling anxious about their financial situation in the last month, with one in 10 feeling hopeless about it. I guess that that goes back to the point made by the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross: in one of the richest economies in the world, people feeling hopeless due to financial precarity is simply unacceptable.

These statistics are only reinforced by the findings of the charity Pregnant Then Screwed, who revealed in their recent survey that over half of parents reported experiencing high levels of anxiety relating to money. That is in addition to the almost two thirds of mothers with a child under 12 months who reported that they either have cut short or will cut short their maternity leave due to cost of living pressures. From the Scottish Women’s Budget Group, we know that women are the shock absorbers of poverty; during a cost of living crisis, I am afraid that that problem is only exacerbated.

If we take a look at the impact across demographics in Scotland, we also know, from Age Scotland, that 43% of over-50s identified as living in fuel poverty, with 9% of over-50s skipping meals. The very fact that so many people are living in fuel poverty and that that has an impact on many constituents in the Easterhouse area of my constituency is, I know, a huge area of concern for my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow North East (Anne McLaughlin), who I think was seeking to catch my eye to make an intervention on this point.

Oral Answers to Questions

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 13th September 2023 Commons Chamber

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

11. What discussions he has held with Cabinet colleagues and the Scottish Government on the devolution of drugs policy to Scotland.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

12. What discussions he has held with Cabinet colleagues and the Scottish Government on the devolution of drugs policy to Scotland.

[The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Alister Jack)]

Illicit drugs destroy lives and devastate communities. The United Kingdom Government’s 10-year drug strategy sets out ambitious plans, backed by a record £3 billion over three years, to tackle the supply of illicit drugs and build a world-class system of treatment and recovery. This is a UK-wide strategy, and there are no plans to devolve drugs policy to the Scottish Government.

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[Marion Fellows]

The Minister did not answer the question, so I will try again. Scotland needs a caring, compassionate, human rights-informed drugs policy with public health and the reduction of harm as its principles, and the Scottish Government are ready and willing to work with the UK Government to put that progressive policy into practice. Scottish Tory MSP Miles Briggs said on “Good Morning Scotland” yesterday that he hoped the UK Government would not move to block this lifesaving measure. Despite the Minister’s Cabinet colleagues continuing to denounce its effectiveness, what recent discussions has he had with the Scottish Government on advancing this pilot scheme?

[Mr Jack]

Drug consumption rooms are not the easy solution hon. Members may think they are. There is no safe way to take illegal drugs. Drugs devastate lives, ruin families and damage communities. The UK Government believe that the police and the Procurator Fiscal Service should fully enforce the law. However, I say to the hon. Lady that if the Scottish Government and the Lord Advocate decide to proceed with a pilot on DCRs, the UK Government will not intervene.

Cost of Living and Brexit

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 14th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Ian Murray]

Indeed, the Education Committee is not represented. Given that it deals with skills, access to employment and the biggest contributor to our economy, which is children’s education, I would have thought that it would be represented on the Committee. However, given that 375 Members or so are already projected to be nominated to this Committee, I am not sure we should have any more. If we do have more, perhaps we should sit as the whole House, as that might be the best way to deal with such issues. SNP Members have not thought this through properly. Perhaps they are frightened of education, because the defining mission of the former First Minister was to close the attainment gap in Scotland. Given that it has got wider, perhaps they do not want to talk about that.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that the Education Committee in this place covers only England? There would therefore be no point in having an appointee from that Committee.

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[David Duguid]

I will in a second. I am aware of the hon. Gentleman and I will give way once I have made some progress.

The £2 billion household support fund was created to support vulnerable families across the whole UK. From 1 April this year, the national living wage increased by 9.7% to £10.42 an hour for workers aged 23 and over. It was previously for workers aged 24 and over. That represents an increase of over £1,600 to the annual earnings of a full-time worker on the national living wage and is expected to benefit over 2 million low-paid workers right across the country.

[Marion Fellows]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[David Duguid]

I want to make some progress and get through this massive long list of improvements that people will experience as a result of this United Kingdom Government. The 80p cut to the taper rate and the £500 increase in the work allowance represent a combined tax cut that will next year be worth £2.2 billion, or an extra £1,000 per person, for 2 million low-income families.

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[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

Putting the word “Brexit” in the title of the debate will have confused those on the Government Benches, because that word has been expunged from their party’s political lexicon.

When talking about the financial difficulties faced by citizens of the United Kingdom, the Government will rightly mention covid. Certain individuals may have got rich on the back of the suffering of those who experienced covid either through their own illness or that of a loved one. More than 220,000 people died of covid in the UK, and people continue to die of it today. A few folk made a bit of money out of it, because the Government awarded contracts to their incompetent mates. We squandered £37 billion on a failed test and trace system, and covid damaged the UK-wide economy. The UK Government will rightly add to the equation the war in Ukraine, which has had a detrimental effect on the economy.

The existence of covid and the Ukraine war cannot be blamed on the Conservative and Unionist Government, which is why they are so keen to place those issues front and centre. It seems, from listening to the countless interviews that have taken place over the past five years or so, that the B-word has now almost entirely disappeared, but Brexit is and has been at the very heart of the Government in that time. They misled the electorate with promises of sunny uplands, as we have already heard, and now they wish to categorise Brexit as the latest entry in the newspeak dictionary. The poor are getting poorer and the rich are getting richer, and until this Government face up to the consequences of their actions, they will never be in a place to address the problems that Brexit has created. With both the Tories and Labour continuing to support a damaging Brexit that has wreaked havoc on the UK economy, it is clear that Westminster offers no answers to the pressures faced by ordinary households. We need a Committee that will focus entirely on that.

The OBR predicted in March that the UK’s GDP will fall by 4% as a result of Brexit, with trade and exports reducing by 15%. Additionally, a senior Bank of England official has said that £29 billion in business investment had been lost because of Brexit, because of leaving the EU. The former US Treasury Chief and top economist, Larry Summers, recently said that Brexit will be remembered as an “historic economic error”, adding that he would be “very surprised” if the UK avoids a recession in the next two years. He also noted that the UK’s economic situation is

“frankly more acute than…in most other major countries.”

All those people know more than me about politics and economics, but I know about people, including people in Motherwell and Wishaw. When I joined this place, I knew of one food bank. During recess, I heard about two more that have opened up— those are just the ones that I heard about during recess—and I visited one of them. People in my constituency are hungry. Grown men turn up at food banks and cry because they cannot feed their families. They want to work, and do work in many cases, but they do not earn enough to pay energy bills and to feed their families.

As for the question of baby milk, how in this country have we got to a stage where a security tag has to be put on baby milk, and where parents are diluting baby milk to make it go further? A Committee looking at the cost of living could look into that sort of thing. As a grandmother, I can tell the House: that is just not on.

The Citizens Advice Scotland social justice spokesperson noted that the energy cap

“remains higher than it was last summer, bills will remain higher than the beginning of this crisis in 2021, and since then people have faced a huge squeeze on their finances.”

As SNP spokesperson on disabilities, I deal all the time with disability organisations; I listen to them and the people they represent. The hon. Member for Banff and Buchan (David Duguid) read out a huge list of things that the Government have done for people during the cost of living crisis, but for disabled families, it is just not enough. Scope has put a price tag on the cost of living in a disabled household as £975 a month. The support given to people who are disabled, their families and their carers has simply not been enough. That leads me back to food banks. A huge percentage of people who attend food banks, because they need to, do so because they are disabled.

I wonder whether the Minister or any Government Members know—I cannot tell the House this—how much it would cost for someone to power five machines overnight to support their disabled child. Families are living with that struggle day and daily. In a country as rich as this, we should all be ashamed of that fact. Let us think of that: five machines for someone to keep their child alive, and they are offered something from the Government—I do not deny it—but it is nothing like enough. We need a social tariff on energy, as called for by Citizens Advice. We need to support people who, through no fault of their own, cannot effectively contribute to the economy, otherwise what is the point of a place like this?

In Scotland, things are better for people with children. The Scottish child payment has made a huge difference to families with children, especially during this economic crisis. This Government really need to look at social security benefits, and to stop dealing with people who have to rely on those inadequate benefits as some form of scroungers. There have always been people who play the social security system—I would not stand here and deny it—but think on the people who play the tax system, hoik all their money offshore and refuse to pay their correct taxes. Let us let this Committee look at that sort of thing. If it is a question of money to help families, households and people in general through this cost of living crisis and make up for the effect of Brexit, let the Committee look at that. Let us have a Committee dedicated to helping end this cost of living crisis.

Oral Answers to Questions

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 17th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

6. What recent discussions he has had with the Scottish Government on support for renewable energy in Scotland.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

12. What recent discussions he has had with the Scottish Government on support for renewable energy in Scotland.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (John Lamont)]

The UK Government remain firmly committed to the renewables industry across the United Kingdom, including the leading role that Scotland can play in delivering energy security and jobs. Over the past year, we have worked closely with the Scottish Government through the offshore wind acceleration taskforce to bring forward the deployment of offshore wind projects in the UK.

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[John Lamont]

The answer is certainly not independence. The answer is ensuring we are doing all we can to reduce connection timescales as a priority. As well as accelerating the timelines for building new network infrastructure, that is also about the process for new projects to connect to the grid, such as how the connection queue is managed. To address that, we will be publishing a connections action plan in the summer, setting out actions by the Government, Ofgem and network companies to accelerate connections for renewable projects and other energy network providers.

[Marion Fellows]

According to the Chancellor, the UK Government’s windfall tax is set to generate £40 billion over six years, and the Minister for Nuclear claimed that taxes on Scotland’s oil and gas sector covered half of the UK energy bill last winter. Until now, however, this Government have failed to support the Acorn carbon capture and storage project in north-east Scotland. Do the Secretary of State and his Minister accept that windfall taxes from Scottish oil and gas should be used not just to pay short-term bills, but to invest in Scotland’s transition to net zero economy?

[John Lamont]

The energy profits levy strikes the right balance by funding the cost of living support while encouraging investment in order to bolster UK energy security. The levy is helping to hold down people’s energy bills right across the United Kingdom, including in Scotland, by partly funding one of the most generous cost of living packages in the world, worth around £96 billion or £3,300 per household. The hon. Lady shakes her head, but I know the benefits of the package for households in my constituency, across Scotland and in the rest of the United Kingdom. We want to encourage the reinvestment of the sector’s profits to support the economy, jobs and our energy security, which is why the more investment a firm makes into the UK, the less tax it will pay.

Oral Answers to Questions

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2023 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

1. Whether he has made a recent assessment of the impact of the UK leaving the European Union on Scotland.

[Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP)]

8. Whether he has made a recent assessment of the impact of the UK leaving the European Union on Scotland.

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[The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Alister Jack)]

There are many benefits of leaving the EU for Scotland. They include: the ability to agree new trade deals and strategic partnerships, controlling our borders, ensuring that regulation fits the needs of the United Kingdom, control of our fishing waters and the ability to improve the competitiveness of our economy while maintaining high standards.

[Marion Fellows]

Statistics from His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs show that Scottish exports have plummeted by £2.2 billion over the two years since Brexit, which has already cost Scotland’s economy around £4 billion. The consequences of Brexit have been invariably harmful. What is the Secretary of State for Scotland doing to protect Scotland from this Tory-imposed act of economic self-harm?

Scottish Referendum Legislation: Supreme Court Decision

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jack]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. On his initial remarks, we are a family of nations and a nation of families.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

I am a bit puzzled. Why do this Government, who do not have a mandate in Scotland, continue to refuse the right of the Scottish people to hold a referendum, as things have changed enormously since 2014?

[Mr Jack]

Because this Government believe that the Scottish people’s priority is to see their two Governments working together in a collaborative and constructive partnership.

Scottish Independence and the Scottish Economy

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jack]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very good point. During the pandemic, in my role as Secretary of State for Scotland I signed many MACA—military aid to civil authorities—requests for Scotland, and our armed services stepped up and did an incredible job of helping us through the process.

In addition to the UK Government support that I mentioned, we are directly investing £2 billion that will be delivered through the city region and growth deals programme, the levelling-up fund and the United Kingdom shared prosperity fund. Those projects are starting to transform communities and create tens of thousands of high-quality new jobs.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State goes on about levelling up and how grateful we in Scotland should be for money that is disbursed from the UK centre at Westminster. Does he actually believe that? Does he not understand that people in Scotland pay taxes here as well as in Scotland and that we are entitled to a share of all those funds?

[Mr Jack]

All the SNP councils in Scotland are applying for these funds, and they have been welcomed. I remember the leader of Glasgow City Council—an SNP council—saying how pleased she was that the UK Government were delivering those funds directly to local authorities in Scotland. And—guess what?—they are taking that money in its full amount and delivering it to local projects. That is exactly how it should be.

[Marion Fellows]

I have signed applications for levelling-up funds because my community is as entitled to them as communities in the rest of the UK. We pay our taxes as well, and we do not need to be lectured about taking hand-outs, which is what the Secretary of State is implying.

[Mr Jack]

That could not be further from the truth. I am not implying that for a minute. It absolutely is fair shares for everyone; we have never disputed that. All I am explaining is that the method of delivery is through local authorities to get project funds directly to local communities.

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[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

I have sat here for most of the afternoon and listened carefully to all the speeches. I am going to do something slightly different, but I want to make it clear at the start that I am committed to Scottish independence. Anyone who has voted for me three times since 2015 knows that. I have always been returned to this place to represent the people of Motherwell and Wishaw, and I understand that not everyone in Motherwell and Wishaw wants independence, but I also understand that the Scottish Government have a mandate from the last Scottish election, and overall the SNP as a party has a mandate from Scotland to further the cause of independence. We all look forward very much to conducting a referendum next year.

The economic damage this Government have caused since the mini-Budget on 23 September is, as the motion says, truly regrettable. The pound has nosedived, mortgage rates have risen and there is rising inflation. I can remember hard, hard times—I remember Harold Wilson telling me that the pound in my pocket would not be worth any less on devaluation; I brought up a family during the ’80s—but I have never known a time like this.

I think that is partly due to my role as disability spokesperson for my party, because as part of my role I meet disability organisations regularly. I will use the example of one particular organisation that helps families with disabled children and children with long-term illnesses, the Family Fund. When I met the organisation earlier this week—or was it the end of last week? Time moves so strangely here—I was shocked, horrified and deeply moved by what I was listening to.

I am grateful to the Family Fund for the statistics I am using, which are taken from its report, “The Cost of Caring”, based on its research and published only on 7 October this year. Some 64% of parents with caring responsibilities spend between 35 and 100 hours a week caring for their children—only 50% of them are in work—so they are getting benefits.

Increasing household costs make those families’ lives more difficult: on top of pandemic lockdowns and shielding, families have to spend more on energy and the choices they must make are even starker than those of the general population. More than half of parents or carers report skipping or cutting the size of meals; four in five families raising a disabled child or young person are in debt, with debt levels rising for two in five families, and more than 40%,

“report they can’t afford to keep their accommodation warm—an increase of 13% since last December”.

On average, families raising a disabled child live on £17,000 a year and spend 60 hours a week caring for their disabled child, with one third of families caring for more than 100 hours a week.

Family Fund’s report highlights the now unsustainable strain on families raising disabled and seriously ill children and young people, as they try to cover sky-high costs on top of severely reduced incomes due to intense caring responsibilities, the three-times higher costs of looking after a disabled child and critical levels of debt. I could quote Family Fund’s chief executive, Cheryl Ward, and people might wonder what that has to do with independence, but we cannot afford to be tied to a system that treats the most vulnerable people in our society in this way. Members will note that one of the statistics I used was from last year—it was not even to do with the so-called mini-Budget.

The harrowing tales and statistics we have heard from the Family Fund are not isolated; other disability organisations I have met in recent months, such as the Disability Benefits Consortium and Muscular Dystrophy UK, have drawn attention to the deteriorating situation that many of the most vulnerable face in the UK. Across the board, these organisations are calling for benefits to be uprated in line with inflation—that will not even take them back to where they were—and additional, targeted support for those with disabilities, whose essential energy needs are much more extensive.

Recently on the BBC, Yvette Clements said that parents are having to consider putting their disabled children into care due to rising energy bills. Can anyone in this Chamber tell me that that is acceptable? Families of disabled children are facing crippling debt. Some might say, “What does that matter?” but I believe—as I know fellow SNP Members do—that a society can be measured by how it treats its most vulnerable. In the vision of chaos that the current iteration of the UK Government perpetuate, the most vulnerable are treated with contempt. Those with disabilities and caring responsibilities face uncertainty, deprivation and attacks on their human dignity.

I want to talk about a family with two young autistic boys who live in West Sussex. One of the boys has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, while the other suffered brain damage at birth and is doubly incontinent. The family have to do frequent food shops tailored to the children’s specific sensory needs and allergies, which has resulted in their bills almost tripling. The mother of these poor boys originally trained as a special educational needs teacher, but she cannot work, as she is a full-time carer for one of her sons, and she testifies that the cost of living crisis has impacted on the family in a huge way. Families of disabled children face crippling debt just to provide the care needed for their children, who will otherwise suffer and see their conditions worsen.

In Scotland we seek to do things differently. We offer carers additional support through the carer’s allowance supplement, which increases their carer’s allowance by 13%—carer’s allowance has gone up by £3 in 10 years. We also have young carer grant. The Scottish Government are in the process of delivering the overarching changes needed to replace carer’s allowance with Scottish carer’s assistance, which will provide greater support, loosening the needlessly rigid criteria that carers must meet and increasing support in the areas of social care, employability and education.

I also note that child winter payments started in Scotland today, and they are of course administered by Social Security Scotland, which aims to deliver social security with dignity, fairness and respect at its core. At present, less than 15% of such social security benefits are devolved to Scotland, and our ability to create a society built on dignity, fairness and respect is severely impacted by a Westminster system built on cronyism, chaos and inequality.

Like my party and lots of people in Scotland, I feel that an independent Scotland is the only way we can take control of our future and create a more equal society for all, upholding the rights of our most vulnerable citizens. In each of the many iterations of the current Government—and there have been quite a number—those with the least have suffered the most as a result of policy choices. Following years of austerity, which have brought public services to their knees, caused 300,000 excess deaths and run the NHS into the ground, we are now hearing calls for further austerity. On top of the real-terms cuts to wages and benefits, and with inflation at a 40-year high, this sustained attack on society’s most vulnerable does not appear to have an end goal in sight.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Skye, Badenoch and Strathspey—[Hon. Members: “Ross, Skye and Lochaber.”] I am so sorry; I have got carried away with the emotion of what I am saying. My right hon. Friend the Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) asked the Prime Minister today to guarantee uprating benefits in line with inflation, but we did not get an answer. The families that I am talking about are depending on that to protect their children.

I now feel that an independent Scotland is a necessity. It is not just something we think we would like; it is absolutely necessary to protect Scottish citizens from even more devastating policies from the Tory Government. I add my voice to the calls on this Government immediately to reinstate the bankers’ bonus cap, increase benefits in line with inflation, and protect the pensions triple lock. Scotland cannot afford to be part of the failing UK state. We must be independent for economic stability and for the best future for all our citizens born in Scotland or not, and—I add this for the benefit of my granddaughters and my grandson—for those yet to be born.

Oral Answers to Questions

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 20th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

As I am sure the whole House can imagine, we are indeed looking at the excellent suggestion made by my hon. Friend’s constituent, Elizabeth. We are thinking how to recognise the work of healthcare staff, carers and many others, and we are engaging with staff and employers at the present time.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP) [V]]

A senior Government figure told a reporter for The Sunday Times that the UK Government will end the job retention scheme even if the Scottish Government decide to continue with the lockdown to save lives in Scotland. This would be an act from the UK Government that undermined devolution and the Scottish Parliament by slashing incomes to force Scots back to work when it is potentially unsafe. Will the Prime Minister agree to extend the job retention scheme in Scotland for the length of time that Scotland’s Government and Parliament deem a lockdown necessary?

[The Prime Minister]

Perhaps I can just say that I continue to be very happy with the level of co-operation, in spite of what we sometimes hear in this Chamber, between the Governments of all four nations, particularly Scotland. I just remind the hon. Lady, of course, that Scotland has benefited from about £1 billion of coronavirus funding in the last period and will get about £3 billion overall, which is perhaps a material consideration on which she might like to reflect.

Claim of Right for Scotland

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Wednesday 4th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

Today’s debate is not just important for the people of Scotland, but of great importance to the many peoples and nations throughout the world—notably our friends in Catalonia and the political prisoners there, to whom I would like to pay my respects. At the heart of today’s debate is human rights, and specifically a people’s right to self-determination. That is enshrined in international law under article 1 of the United Nations charter, which states that one of the purposes of the UN is to

“develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples”.

I do not believe that anyone in this place—not even Tory Members—would say that Scotland’s people are not a nation. The only conclusion that can be drawn is that Scotland’s people and Parliament have the power to decide their own future.

As the motion states—I am speaking to the motion—it is the sovereign right of the Scottish people to determine the

“form of government best suited to their needs”,

and no one else’s right. I respect the opinion of people here who believe that Scotland should remain in the UK, and Scotland did vote to do so, but that was before it voted to remain in the EU. I ask those same people to respect the will of the Scottish people on that matter.

[Mr Carmichael]

What Scotland voted for was for the United Kingdom to remain part of the European Union. I campaigned and voted for that, but I did not want to see my vote then used as a lever to break up the United Kingdom. When the hon. Lady tries to do that, she does so not in my name or in the name of the majority of my constituents.

[Marion Fellows]

The right hon. Gentleman is looking very angrily at me.

[Mr Carmichael]

That is just my natural expression; you can’t hold that against me.

[Marion Fellows]

In that case, I apologise.

We will never agree on this. We are talking about the sovereign right of the Scottish people. I choose not to divide my country. I love my country. When I talk to people in Motherwell and Wishaw, the one thing they say they really love is their Scottish Parliament. That is why we are talking about the claim of right.

We can exchange figures, numbers and percentages, but what is important is that decisions were made by the Scottish people based on the circumstances of the time. That is the very nature of democracy, from elections to referendums. Today’s political reality is that there have been major upheavals to the fundamental political and economic circumstances of modern-day Scotland, and it is on that basis that Scotland must again reconsider its options.

Scotland is at a crossroads. We must decide not only what form of government best suits our needs, but what type of country we are. That discussion is going on in homes, communities and workplaces across Scotland as people slowly but surely decide. People in Scotland see the Prime Minister walking hand in hand with Donald Trump. They see the rich getting richer while their communities and neighbours struggle. They see this place treating Scotland with utter disdain, giving devolution only 15 minutes of consideration—and that time was totally taken up by the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. With foreign wars, nuclear weapons on the Clyde, food bank use through the roof and precarious low-paid employment, people in Scotland imagine something better for their lives which Westminster has failed time and again to deliver: peace, security and more power over the decisions that affect their lives.

[Christine Jardine]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Marion Fellows]

No, because I have only three minutes left.

Scotland is not a country that is quick to take to the streets, but what the recent independence demonstrations have shown, as have the past demonstrations against Westminster’s poll tax and Thatcher’s decimation of Scottish industry, is that once Scotland has made up its mind, it will continue to pursue its interests in the face of adversity. Anyone who opposes Scotland’s sovereign right is exposing a truth widely held in Scotland, and indeed by the Secretary of State for Scotland, that we are not an equal partner in the UK and that we must ask permission to make our own decisions.

[David Mundell]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Marion Fellows]

I only have three minutes left, so I cannot give way.

Those people are exposing the fact that a democratically elected Parliament’s decision to hold a referendum—the most direct form of democracy imaginable—must be rubber-stamped by Westminster. Anyone who recognises and celebrates the no vote of 2014 but then seeks to undermine Scotland’s sovereignty by discrediting any future vote exposes a crucial contradiction in their argument and does not understand the pride that the Scottish people take in their Parliament.

[Christine Jardine]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Marion Fellows]

No, I want to finish my speech.

[Christine Jardine]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Marion Fellows]

No, I am going to continue.

While the UK Government seek to evaporate the Sewel convention and rely on outdated principles of Westminster sovereignty, the people of Scotland will be the ones who decide where their legitimate government and interests lie. No politician, party or Parliament can; this is about the Scottish people. Whatever the outcome of this debate, it will always be the case that Scotland’s sovereignty does not need to be recognised by parties that Scotland rejects or by Westminster; its sovereignty needs to be recognised only by the people of Scotland themselves.

I am sorry that the amendment that was tabled has not been selected, but as the claim of right exists, the only thing that is decisive is the will of the Scottish people as expressed through elections and referendums. That will is fluid and changing. We only need to look at the opinion polls—they have been taken all the way through from 2014—since the Brexit vote. The minority Conservative Government are well aware of those polls. It is undemocratic to bind Scotland or any other country to the decisions of the past, to protect the interests of the Tory party.

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill: Sewel Convention

Marion Fellows Excerpts

Thursday 14th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[David Mundell]

Mr Murray Foote is a good friend of mine, and he will stay a good friend. I have many friends who support independence, just as I have many friends who voted for Scotland to remain part of the United Kingdom. That is the basis on which the debates in Scotland should be conducted—a much more convivial and civil basis than they have been recently. The antics of the right hon. Member for Ross, Skye and Lochaber (Ian Blackford) yesterday do not help, because they agitate the political environment in Scotland, and, rather than enhancing the opportunity to debate issues, they reduce it.

[Marion Fellows (Motherwell and Wishaw) (SNP)]

I agree with many of my hon. Friends that the Secretary of State is a nice man, and I respect him personally, but does he not see that his Government’s complete distain for Scotland extends even to his position? He was sidelined during the Brexit discussions and had no place at the table to discuss the impact on Scotland. His paymasters hold him in the same contempt as they hold the Scottish people. When comes the point at which principle takes over for the Secretary of State?

[David Mundell]

I can agree that the hon. Lady is a nice lady, and I have always got on well with her, but beyond the initial part of her question I do not agree with her. My role is to be at the heart of the Government, ensuring that Scotland’s issues and concerns are taken into account, not only on Brexit but on a whole range of other issues. I know that, like her colleagues, the hon. Lady does not accept the current constitutional arrangements, but I will continue to do my job of standing up for Scotland within the United Kingdom.