SNP Gaza Ceasefire Vote - an explainer

What is happening in Palestine right now is the stuff of unimaginable horrors. I wrote about it, and in particular the impact on women, for my column for The Sunday National at the weekend and you can read about that here https://www.thenational.scot/politics/24142139.anne-mclaughlin-speaker-lindsay-hoyle-destroyed-credibility/

An immediate ceasefire is the only thing that will force an immediate stop to human beings being killed, maimed or forced to flee what’s left of their homes.

Because of this, the SNP opted to use our opposition day debate slot to call a vote on an immediate and permanent ceasefire. It's worth mentioning what an opposition day is and how they work. The two main opposition parties are given allocated time to hold a debate (and vote) on subjects of their choosing throughout the year. Labour are given 17 days, the SNP are given 3.

Labour have held 8 opposition day debates since October 7th - not once have they chosen to speak about the atrocities in Gaza. In fact, their last opposition day debate was on Ministerial Severance Pay.

What followed was farcical, unprecedented and an affront to democracy.

MUCH more importantly, what happened was the time spent talking about the most important matter was hijacked and cut down.

As someone who cares enough about Palestine to have written to me, you deserve to know the full story.

This is what happened.

• We, the SNP, tabled our motion on a ceasefire and you can see it beneath my signature. It was then open to the Government or the Labour Party to put forward an amendment to the Speaker.

• Both parties did so and it was then up to the Speaker to decide whose amendment to accept (for debate and vote). Common practice is for the Government’s amendment to be selected.

• Rumours started to circulate that Labour MPs were briefing journalists that earlier, when the debate should have started but didn’t because Labour MPs were raising multiple points of order, they had in fact been stalling for time so that Keir Starmer could ‘fix’ the Speaker in order to ensure that Labour’s amendment was selected and not only that but that it would be voted on before the motion of the debate. The purpose of that was to ensure they were not asked to vote on the SNP wording.

• The Speaker arrived late to the chamber once all the ‘points of order’ were over and announced that he had selected both amendments.

• That is unusual in itself but when there is an amendment, what normally (ie ALWAYS) happens is that the party whose debate it is can have their motion put to a vote and THEN the amendment is put to a vote. However The Speaker decided that the Labour Party’s amendment would be voted on first. (Just as the rumours suggested would happen.)

• Forget, for a moment, that there are MPs effectively stitching up a vote, more important than that is what it meant in terms of the UK Parliament’s commitment to Palestine.

• The Labour amendment was not so much an amendment. Their ‘amendment’ called for the SNP motion to be deleted in its entirety and replaced with a watered down, equivocal motion and one that refused to acknowledge the collective punishment of Palestinians. What this means is, if MPs voted FOR Labour’s amendment, the SNP motion would fall and we could not call a vote on it. Bear in mind it was one of only 3 opportunities a year that we have to do this. But again, the thing uppermost in our minds as we sat in the chamber at this point was that the robust unequivocal commitment to a ceasefire and calling out the collective punishment of Palestinians would not be voted on.

• The Government then refused to play any further part in it they said, because The Speaker’s decision was so highly irregular. It then became guaranteed that the Labour amendment would go through because there were no Conservatives to vote against it and therefore, the scenario I have described above would play out ie there would be no vote on our unequivocal motion.

• There was no way that we, in the SNP, could vote against the Labour amendment because creeping forward slowly towards a possible ceasefire is better than nothing. So we said we would vote for it but with nobody voting against it, that mean our motion was not voted on. So progress was made in that there was a statement from the UK parliament (FINALLY) saying there should be a ceasefire but it wasn’t anywhere near as strong as it should have been.

• The SNP group leader Stephen Flynn raised a number of points of order to query the fact that the rules had simply been changed. He noted that the clerks who advise The Speaker had issued a letter telling MPs that they had advised against this. But by this time The Speaker had gone and the Deputy Speaker was closing down questioning so we left the chamber.

• I have read tweets from MPs of other parties who claim that we left parliament but they know and they have always known that we did not do this. They knew that we were in what they call The Aye Lobby waiting to vote AYE to their watered down amendment.

• Next thing that happened was that a vote was not allowed. The process is that the Speaker asks ‘all those in favour’ and MPs shout ‘aye’, he or she then asks ‘all those against’ and MPs shout ‘no’. If nobody says ‘no’ there’s an assumption nobody is opposed to it and the motion is carried. However a number on the government side clearly shouted ‘no’. If you watch it on TV you can see the Deputy Speaker looking over to them and telling THEM ‘no’ and then she simply declares that ‘the AYES have it’ – in other words, that amendment has won. As I say we were waiting to vote AYE but I want you to be clear about what happened because I am also reading nonsense that says we refused to vote.

• That then meant our motion was deleted by Labour and replaced by theirs.

• The Speaker then came back into the chamber and was challenged again by Stephen Flynn. He apologised and claimed he had done this because he was worried about MPs’ safety, pretty hard to believe as he had not mentioned it at the start. That needs to be addressed because what he meant was that if Labour MPs didn’t vote for the SNP motion for a ceasefire, they would be threatened by pro Palestine campaigners. That statement has allowed a growing narrative since then that conflates those fighting for the rights of dying Palestinians with a violent movement and that is completely unfair and extremely dangerous to our democracy. Be assured we are questioning and challenging this at every turn.

• The Speaker as well as apologising, promised we could have our debate and that he was open to an application for what is called an SO24 – an emergency debate. He also offered to meet with Stephen Flynn. In that meeting, Stephen understood that we would have our debate on Monday of this week.

• The SNP group applied for the SO24 debate and we focused our motion on specifics eg ending arms sales. Several of us changed our plans and by that I mean we had meetings and visits and surgeries in our constituencies that had to be cancelled. Votes don’t take place till 10pm on a Monday so unless you are speaking in a debate you can be in the constituency and travel down later in the day. But it was all in vain because we got there and The Speaker refused us that debate.

• We are keen not to be too reactive, we are mulling things over because, whilst we absolutely WILL stand up to all attempts to silence Scotland, right now, the matter in hand ie the collective punishment of Palestinians, is what matters. The situation, as you know, is utterly desperate so we are working out how best we can keep influencing others to come round to our way of thinking. I am glad that Labour now seems to be supporting a ceasefire but sorry they had to be dragged kicking and screaming to that position. I should say the 100 plus Labour MPs who were going to vote for our motion feel exactly as we do.

We are working hard on finding a way forward for Palestinians, on ensuring Scotland’s voice is not silenced by a Speaker silenced by the Labour leader and on the issues that have a direct impact on the lives of our constituents.

Please do keep in touch. I keep being told my constituents don’t want me to talk about Palestine. Every email I receive tells me otherwise. Together we absolutely must do everything we can for our fellow human beings in the Middle East. And let’s not forget a number of your neighbours are Palestinian and are in touch with me regularly – they appreciate the support, they NEED the support. Let’s not waver.