Sexual Offences (Pardons Etc) Bill

Stewart Malcolm McDonald Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 21st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)]

It is always a pleasure to star in another episode of “Carry on up the Commons”, which is what it has been like in here this morning.

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (John Nicolson). I do not call him my honourable friend just to obey the conventions of the House. I say it because he is both honourable and a true friend. What a piece of legislation he has brought to the House. It is the first ever SNP private Member’s Bill—an historic moment no less—although he does not wish to present it as such, and I agree with that.

In his remarks, my hon. Friend referred to his time with Edwina Currie in Amsterdam. I urge all Members when they get the chance—perhaps outside the Chamber—to ask him about the stilettos disappearing up the stairs. I seem to remember him saying “from a room with very few lights.” I will leave it to him to develop that further.

When my hon. Friend was called to introduce a Bill, he was top of the ballot. I confess to feeling just a tiny bit of seething jealousy on that morning as I opened my Twitter account on my iPad to see him No. 1 on the ballot. Had it been me, this is exactly the Bill that I would have wished to introduce. We had several conversations about different ideas that he had, and this was the one that he chose to bring to the House, and he is to be enormously congratulated on that.

What a forensic speech from the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant). It was an historical speech, and referred to the shields of previous hon. Members in this House, and he is to be thanked because we are better informed as a result of his remarks.

I want to share one or two stories from constituents of mine, whom I shall not name. One of them is quite well known in left-wing circles in Scottish politics. This took place at a time when there were no LGBT centres, no gay bars, and no places where the gay community could go to socialise. It often meant that they had to socialise at home—having parties in friends’ houses and such. He told me about one particular party in Rutherglen. It was held in a flat that had become the place to which they would go. My hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) claims from a sedentary position, that she was not there. This was in the 1960s. The neighbours at the time had cottoned on to the fact that there were these devious homosexual men and women having a party—I should break it to some people that when we homosexuals have a party, it is just like any other party only much more fun. At the party, there would have been music, laughter, gossip, dancing, singing and perhaps even a wee drink or two. When the neighbours cottoned on to the fact that the flat was full of homosexuals, they would call the police. The police would then visit the flat—no crime having been committed and no antisocial behaviour having taken place—and take the names and addresses of every person there, asking why they were there and intimidating them.

When my constituent saw the police coming up the stairs, he decided that he was not going to stay in the room. As he could not exactly leave by the front door, he decided to hang out of the window—from the second storey of a Glasgow tenement—putting himself in clear danger of not just injuring himself, but perhaps even losing his life. When his arms could take it no further, he crawled in through the window, and had to give a statement to the police.

Such is the ingenuity of good Glaswegians, they thought to themselves, “Should this ever happen again, we need to have a plan.” They decided to borrow—not to steal—the choir books from the Rutherglen parish church, so that if the police were to come back, the music could be switched off, the drinks could be put away and all they would be confronted with is the Rutherglen parish church choir singing “Kumbayah”.

[John Nicolson]

You haven’t been to church recently, have you?

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald]

I should say that God is always surprised to see me when I attend prayers in this House.

Although we laugh, that is what people were going through, and much, much worse has been adumbrated to the House by other Members. Things have moved on remarkably, but even through the 1980s, friends of mine talk about going to pride parades in London where the streets would be lined with police looking as though they were expecting some kind of violent protest. In a magnificent act of defiance, a friend of mine tied a pink balloon to the strap of his bag, so that it would bounce off the noses of the police officers as he marched down the street.

Look at us now—out and proud. There is not a Member here—certainly not on the SNP Benches—who is not desperate to be associated with the progress in gay rights. It is now very popular to be in favour of equality, but it did not used to be. What this Bill seeks to do is right the wrong. I should just say that the Government and the House are not doing us a favour by doing this: equal marriage was not a favour and equality of adoption rights was not a favour. It is about correcting our mistakes of the past.

Imagine you are a young person thinking of coming out, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is 6 o’clock and you turn on your computer or iPad and across your Twitter timeline comes the story of how today’s vote goes. Imagine if the House declined the opportunity to pass this Bill; how would that make you feel? What kind of signal does it send to young people across this country and around the world if we decline to pass this Bill today?

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald]

Certainly; one young man to another.

[Alan Brown]

A gay man to a straight man. Does my hon. Friend agree that the message coming from some in other parties is that living homosexuals could still be at risk of being classified as a paedophile? That is the message if we reject this Bill.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I should also clarify that I am the gay man here; I would never have that clash of a yellow lanyard with a purple tie—and I have seen him in worse as well.

The 16,000 people the hon. Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt) mentioned, and many others, are the giants on whose shoulders we stand. Today we have an opportunity to do the right thing. Symbolism is important in this; rather than have some anonymous technical amendment in that place along the corridor—which is even more camp than this place—a Bill is important. Where there are concerns, genuine or otherwise, the Committee is the place to strengthen the Bill, otherwise what is this place for—a question I find myself asking quite a lot, actually?

What I think we all want today is for young people to read about and watch this debate, and see this Bill pass. That would send a strong and positive message that it is indeed okay to be gay.

Saudi Penal System

Stewart Malcolm McDonald Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the Chairman of the Select Committee for making that point. Governments always have to balance the vital importance of upholding human rights with necessary security considerations, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the confidence he places in the Government’s decision in this case.

[Stewart Malcolm McDonald (Glasgow South) (SNP)]

The power of the urgent question indeed. This is a victory, if we believe press reports, for the Secretary of State himself, but also for the Gulf Centre for Human Rights, which has been vociferous in challenging the decision.

This is not, of course, an easy issue. The contract was being negotiated against a backdrop of a Government who have beheaded more people than Daesh, who are about to lash a British pensioner 350 times, potentially crucify a teenager and have sentenced a blogger to a slow death sentence, so I can genuinely understand why a Government would seek to involve themselves in changing how they manage the justice system. However, questions need to be asked about the whole approach to and relationship with Saudi Arabia, and about why the Government have dropped abolishing the death penalty as a priority in their international work abroad. What assistance did this Government give to the Government of Saudi Arabia so that they could chair a committee on human rights within the United Nations? Why did the British Government sanction flags flying at half-mast when the King of Saudi Arabia died—something that the Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson called

“a steaming pile of nonsense”?

I welcome today’s move, but this cannot be the end of our examination of our relationship with Saudi Arabia. One thing the Justice Secretary could do would be to place all papers relating to this deal in the public domain, so that Parliament can examine them retrospectively.

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his detailed questions. Some, of course, strayed into diplomatic matters, which are not the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice, but I can confirm that whenever any monarch of any country dies, the flag is flown at half-mast. It is a long-standing convention—one that has been honoured in the past and continues to be honoured.

The hon. Gentleman’s broader point about the administration of justice within Saudi Arabia was well made. We have profound concerns about the respect accorded to human rights within Saudi Arabia, but it is also the case—I must stress this—that the most effective way of ensuring that human rights progress can be made in Saudi Arabia, both for its citizens and for others, is to allow the Foreign Office to continue its diplomatic work, which balances the strong relationships built up over time with an absolute insistence that in all countries and at all times, we oppose the death penalty. We will never resile from that.