Fewer than half of MPs vote for real-terms cut to pensions and social security – but Tory move passes easily as Starmer whips Labour to abstain again. Only 13 Labour MPs rebelled
Liverpool West Derby MP Ian Byrne was one of only thirteen Labour MPs to rebel against Keir Starmer’s order to abstain – yet again – on a Commons vote on a Tory move to impose a real-terms cut on pensions and other social security benefits.
The motion, which mandated an increase of only 3.1% – well below inflation, which continues to rise – passed by 298 votes to 29.
Byrne had tweeted before the debate about the impact the Tory plan would have on the millions of poor and vulnerable people in this country:
The thirteen Labour MPs, according to the Hansard record, were:
Begum, Apsana
Burgon, Richard
Byrne, Ian
Carden, Dan
Lavery, Ian
Lloyd, Tony
Long Bailey, Rebecca
McDonnell, rh John
Morris, Grahame
Smith, Cat
Sultana, Zarah
Whittome, Nadia
Winter, Beth
Bell Ribeiro-Addy and Andy McDonald – who resigned from the front bench rather than obey Starmer’s instruction to speak against a decent minimum wage at Labour’s conference last September – acted as ‘tellers for the noes’, meaning they did not get a vote but would have been in that voting lobby otherwise. Details of any ‘paired’ MPs, who don’t vote to balance out the votes of opposing MPs unable to attend, are not yet known. Jon Trickett is on medical leave, but tweeted support for Byrne’s comment.
Keir Starmer appears addicted to abstention, presumably in the hope of not being seen to stand for anything Tory voters don’t like – including the Conservatives’ bill to make agents of the state immune to prosecution for crimes, including rape and murder, committed while undercover. He also ordered MPs to abstain on the bill to criminalise democratic protest with penalties of up to ten years, before eventually u-turning after police violence toward women at the Clapham Common protest.
Even one Tory MP voted against the Tory measure – several spoke against it but did not vote against.
His cowardice is a direct insult and injury to the millions in poverty, hunger and insecurity under a Tory government with which he seems all too aligned – and it makes the continuation of those hurts all the more certain, as voters switch off in disgust at the lack of a real alternative.
SKWAWKBOX needs your help. The site is provided free of charge but depends on the support of its readers to be viable. If you’d like to help it keep revealing the news as it is and not what the Establishment wants you to hear – and can afford to without hardship – please click here to arrange a one-off or modest monthly donation via PayPal or here to set up a monthly donation via GoCardless (SKWAWKBOX will contact you to confirm the GoCardless amount). Thanks for your solidarity so SKWAWKBOX can keep doing its job.
If you wish to republish this post for non-commercial use, you are welcome to do so – see here for more.
What part of “people who want benefits to be cut would NEVER vote Labour!” does Keir not understand? It’s not as if Labour needs to be to the RIGHT of the Tories on half the issues to be “electable”, for god’s sakes.
Deviating from subject – but a bit
more cheerful news. I came across
the recording of an Event which happened
tonight – celebrating “Latin Americas 2nd
Pink Tide” with Jeremy Corbyn as a speaker.
Its worth a watch.
The Labour party have effectively kicked the vulnerable people in the face.People on so called social security and the elderly on state pension have watched the House of Horrors give themselves a inflation busting pay rise at the very same time slashing the benifits of pensions and social security.
Once again these parasites against the working-class people of Britain show were the interests are..Well done ian Byrne and the handful of Labour mps and wonder why you are still in the Labour party….
Won’t they be suppressed at all the x-labour members abstaining when they want our vote! They think a few Tory-lite’s are going to outweigh all os us? Oh, boy is this going to be a absolute carnage at the next election!!
I just hope Pal and the other left wing parties manages to get enought candidates and money to take this disgraced party down for good. I hate wishing to see the end of a party I have supported for 40+ years and another 70+ in my Family. But no longer will I vote for them if I can’t vote for a true left wing candidate. Then abstention of vote with ‘None of the above’ on it will have to do for the first time in my life. I will not avoid the vote it’s too important and to hard fought for right.
Now all that time and effort worthless thanks to the right wing scumbags turning the once great Labour party into a zombie party awaiting it’s grave it dug itself…
There is no point in the Labour Party anymore. Just a bunch of Red Tory Rubber Stamping wankers……No wonder they get heckled in the streets. Cannot wait for the next bunch of elections to arrive….
I wonder how long it will take for usual ” antisemite” accusations to be hurled at these decent people.
I have no doubt somebody is trawling the records right now in the hope of finding out that one of their great grandfathers lived next door to the second cousin of a blackshirt and once said good morning to him- in Starmers Labour that should be enough to have them kicked out “antisemitism”
Have a look at Rachael Swindon’s tweets.
She is a vile racist transphobe.
Hates black people.
These days, Swindon’s banner is “No Lives Matter…Other Than The Lives Of The Rich, Heteronormative, White & Healthy, Of Course”.>
What’s going on with Swindon? That whole twitter scene seems badly fractured now. It seems that those (twitter left) guys aren’t co-ordinating their efforts any more and the results are ugly.
The centrist box still whining about the Labour Party?
Sad ,sad ,sad .
You are as radical as STARMER!!
I see steveH has some competition.
Though the last thing this site needs is the level of misogyny evident in that competition.
I hope this is enough for people to vote for TUSC candidate Dave Nellist in the up-and-coming by-election, Dave who used to be a Labour MP for Coventry North, until he was kick out by Neil Kinnoch for not supporting him in abstaining with Labour to support to Thatcher Tory government
Peter wytt .There should not be any doubt that any decent members of the Labour party along with the public can voteTUSC without any form of guilt.With a Candidate of Dave nellists standing a win is possible in a bye election.Recent publicity about Johnson and Starmer puts neither in a good light.The mps can say what they will but nobody trusts them anymore and that includes the Labour party.IF theres enough activists to get the vote out on election day then a shock might be possible..
Oh Dear.
It could be suggested that Right Wing Labour (a) lacks the political courage to fight for the poor and (b) the political acumen to counter the Right Wing dominant narrative on welfare?
Of course there are 2 welfare states, ours, the working class one which is deliberately meagre, is associated with Shame and stigma, includes cruel sanctions plus is itself under attack.
Accept low pay & conditions or this is what you get!
Then the is the upper class welfare state where the rich & better off are subsidised to the hilt with tax reliefs, tax concessions and tax incentives plus this is associated with luxury as the rich far from stand on their own two feet.
And for example big business gets £97b a year alone which is the equivalent of £3,500 per household.
Of course the Tories have deliberately set neighbour against neighbour concerning welfare which distracts from tax cuts for millionaires who are distant from most peoples lives.
The Commission on Social Security has just come out with a very good report ‘The Plan: For An Alternative Social Security System’ which offers good recommendations.
Sadly some fall for the dominant Right Wing narrative on welfare, and its seems Right Wing Labour does too?
This Labour party attacks the system that they pioneered the welfare state “.These fascists are not Labour just parasites in the neo liberal alliance..A body that devours its own creation deserves to be obliterated.
There’s a Lesson in all this. If you want to know what an ineffective leader of Labour, an abject liar and a two-faced double agent (only UK-born member of Trilateral Commission) REALLY thinks on important issues, look at what he orders his MPs to abstain on. There’s method in his madness.
Just over a year ago, Labour’s front bench backed a big increase in the military budget—already one of the biggest in the world!
A note of the word unfolded “used in the passive language of Sir keir starmer as if it” the bloody Sunday massacre “unfolded by accident rather than orders by unknown individuals in the government and on the ground in Derry city.
Strange then that the new york times should also use this same description.which also gave way to angry US readers of such a passive aggressive description of mass murderer of innocent civilians.in Derry n.Ireland.Now we all know that the American use of the English language is international rather than the British version but for such a unsuitable decription to be adopted by the american media is an amazing coincidence?Over a period of four hours civilians were murdered and some thrown in the back of saracen armoured vehicles and never seen again without a bullet hole in their heads.Many shot in the back and finished off by British officers with a shot to the head is not” unfolded “but out and out massacre.and a planned one in advance of the civil rights march.We are now calling for elections in N.Ireland to avoid the whole unravelling of the Good Friday agreement and the protocol which the DUP wish to bring about with the support of the conservative government and the Labour party Opposition so called…The DUP can only survive if this crisis of non government is allowed to” “unfold and sectarian violence ensures the survival of this flat earth backward looking Unionists the DUP….I make no apology for bringing the subject up.when we are drifting into a catastrophe again planned and executed by the Conservative and unionist party in government.
This can’t be right, it didn’t feature on BBC News.