Business of the House

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Thursday 14th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the SNP spokesperson.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and North Perthshire) (SNP)]

It would be remiss of me not to congratulate the hon. Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) and welcome him to his place. He is the very epitome of bizarre Brexitism, and he is now finally part of the payroll that up to now he has always loathed. When they have got so far down the pecking order to fill places in this ramshackle Government, we know that they have finally reached the bare Bones.

We need a debate about squatting and forced evictions, because we have a problem here in central London that we need to resolve. At the bottom end of Whitehall, there is someone we just cannot get rid of: Schrödinger’s Prime Minister, simultaneously gone and apparently still here. His latest wheeze is this vote on Monday: a Government tabling a vote of confidence in themselves. It would be great to think that they have finally got it and that they will be joining us in relieving this nation of this appalling Conservative Government, but actually it is more ridiculous than that. Knowing that any motion specifying the Prime Minister would probably be passed in this House, they have decided to make it a motion about a Government they can barely fill—a motion of confidence in themselves. Denying Labour’s legitimate motion was just shocking; it was against every principle of House democracy. Any Opposition must be able to table a motion of confidence in the Government at any time and in any way they want.

Wednesday was an appalling instance of democracy denial, but at least it was a diversion from the tedious, grotesque Tory anti-beauty parade. The “I’m the Most Right-Wing Candidate…Get Me Out of Here!” franchise is making Margaret Thatcher look almost like Mary Poppins. One of those people is going to be Prime Minister. For the third time in a row, a small group of Conservative party members will determine who governs Scotland. Is it not therefore timely that today our First Minister will lay out the democratic case for an independent Scotland? I do not know what will be in it, Mr Speaker, but I can tell you something: it will be almost the exact opposite of what happens in this place.

[Mark Spencer]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his questions. When he had a pop at my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough, I think he lost the Chamber. My hon. Friend is very popular in this place.