Category Archives: Scottish National party (SNP)

Trans woman guilty of raping two women remanded in female prison in Scotland

Posted on by

Politicians, campaigners and UN special rapporteur concerned by case of Isla Bryson, who offended before she had transitioned

Politicians, campaigners and a UN special rapporteur have all expressed grave concerns that a transgender woman found guilty of raping two women before transitioning is being remanded in a female prison.

Opponents of the Scottish government’s gender recognition reforms – which the UK government has blocked from going for royal assent because of “safety issues for women and children” – said that the case vindicated their concerns about lack of safeguards in the bill.

Continue reading...

No 10 declines to say Sunak confident Zahawi has always told him truth about his tax affairs – UK politics live

Posted on by

Downing Street spokesperson also says inquiry into former chancellor’s affairs to be ‘conducted swiftly’

There are two urgent questions in the Commons later. At 12.30pm Caroline Lucas (Green) is asking one about the child asylum seekers who have gone missing from hotel accommodation provided by the Home Office, and that will be followed by Ben Bradshaw (Lab) asking one about the Church of England’s stance on equal marriage.

After those are over Damian Hinds, the justice minister, will deliver a statement about the probation inspectorate.

Continue reading...

Scottish government to challenge Westminster decision to block gender recognition bill in court – UK politics live

Posted on by

Nicola Sturgeon says her government will be ‘vigorously defending’ democracy as well as the bill passed in Scotland

I am sorry the comments are closed at the moment. There has been an update this morning that has created a glitch with the system, but the developers are trying to fix it as quickly as possible.

Labour has been anxious to avoid taking sides on the Scottish gender recognition reform bill. Although Keir Starmer has criticised aspects of the bill, and argued it might have an impact on UK equality laws, he has accused both the UK and Scottish governments of politicising the issues and implied that Labour would adopt a more consensual approach.

Continue reading...

Starmer calls on Sunak to stand up to ERG and ‘Brexit purity cult’– UK politics live

Posted on by

Leader of the Labour party made the comments during a speech on Brexit in Northern Ireland

The UK culture secretary, Michelle Donelan, has said she is “not ruling out” changing the online safety bill to allow regulators to prosecute social media bosses who are found not to have protected children’s safety.

Donelan told the BBC she was open to making changes that have been demanded by dozens of Conservative MPs, saying she would take a “sensible approach” to their ideas.

Obviously this is a very sensitive area and I know there were very robust debates and exchanges on it as the bill was passing in Scotland. What I’m concerned about is the impact of the bill across the United Kingdom.

There may be impacts across the UK that we need to be aware of and understand the impact of them, and that’s what we’re doing, and once the government has received final advice it will set out next steps.

This is not just a question about the GRR people’s individual views on it. This is about democracy.

The Scottish parliament has voted in favour of legislation that sits within devolved competencies, and it’s incumbent upon Westminster to ensure that legislation is passed in full.

Continue reading...

SNP MP proposes paid leave for UK parents who have experienced miscarriage

Posted on by

Angela Crawley’s private member’s bill aims to grant three days of statutory paid leave to grieving parents

Ministers have been urged to back proposals that would grant paid leave to parents who have experienced miscarriage.

Under current UK law, people are not granted maternity leave or pay if they have had a miscarriage.

Continue reading...

SNP restores whip to MP Patrick Grady after sexual assault suspension

Posted on by

Alleged victim says end of suspension is ‘slap in face to anyone who has experienced sexual harassment’

The SNP has restored the party whip to a senior MP who has sat as an independent since June after an independent parliamentary inquiry found he made an unwanted sexual advance towards a teenage party worker.

Patrick Grady quit the SNP group at Westminster after a two-day suspension from parliament, imposed after the independent parliamentary standards commissioner found he had made the advances to the then 19-year-old man in 2016. The man to whom he made the advances said the end of Grady’s suspension was “a slap in the face to anyone who has experienced sexual harassment”.

Continue reading...

UK government might block Scottish gender recognition reform bill – as it happened

Posted on by

Scottish secretary hints that Westminster may use rare power to block new law which removes need for diagnosis of gender dysphoria for gender recognition certificate

At the Scottish parliament Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, is taking questions. Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader, asks about the gender recognition reform (Scotland) bill and amendments rejected by the Scottish government. He says the bill would allow a man standing trial for raping a woman to force his victim to refer to him as a woman, not a man, and he asks Sturgeon why she voted against an amendment that would have prevented this.

In response, Sturgeon says many amendments have been rejected in the past days. She says where amendments were rejected, it was often because there were alternative ways to add safeguards to the bill. These new safeguards covered sex offenders, she says.

Health and care is under huge strain in the run-up to Christmas. These figures suggest there is absolutely no slack in the system, which is dangerously close to overheating completely.

A key part of the problem is that the vast majority of hospital beds are full – around 95% – including with thousands of patients fit to be discharged. The lack of community and social care means they’ll be spending this Christmas in hospital.

Continue reading...

Scottish parliament vote on gender recognition changes delayed until Thursday

Posted on by

Vote on law that would remove need for diagnosis of gender dysphoria to obtain gender recognition certificate pushed back after fraught debate

The final vote on the Scottish government’s long-awaited changes to simplify how someone can legally change gender has been delayed until Thursday after two days of fraught, chaotic and sometimes emotional debate among MSPs.

With discussion of more than 150 amendments continuing late into Wednesday night, the decision was taken by Holyrood business managers to re-schedule the crunch vote for Thursday afternoon rather than have the session run on into the early hours.

Continue reading...

Scotland’s gender recognition bill became a lightning rod for wider issues

Posted on by

The SNP’s proposals including making it easier to get a gender recognition certificate polarised national politics and provoked angry debates over rights

When Scotland’s first minister, Nicola Sturgeon, pledged to reform gender recognition laws at a LGBTQ+ leaders’ hustings before the 2016 Holyrood elections, she could not have envisaged the escalating toxicity and political polarisation that would ultimately surround her plans, nor the personal toll it would exact.

The proposals to bring in a system of self-declaration for individuals wishing to change their legal gender has led to multiple protests outside the Holyrood parliament, booing the avowedly feminist first minister as a “destroyer of women’s rights”. It has prompted the SNP’s biggest ever backbench rebellion and brought Sturgeon head to head with another of Scotland’s best-known women, the Harry Potter author JK Rowling, who on the eve of the final vote described the gender recognition reform bill as “the single biggest rollback of women’s rights in our lifetimes”.

Continue reading...

RCN accuse government of ‘belligerence’ as talks to avert strike action fail; Wales strikes to go ahead – as it happened

Posted on by

Royal College of Nursing says Steve Barclay refused to discuss pay at meeting on Monday; Welsh nurses to strike after last-minute talks fail. This blog is now closed

Pat Cullen, the Royal College of Nursing’s general secretary, told ITV this morning that there was no point talking to Steve Barclay, the health secretary, if he was not prepared to discuss pay. She said

What I’m saying … to the health secretary this morning, is if you don’t want to speak to me directly about nurses’ pay, we have engaged with the conciliation service Acas, they can do that through Acas, but our door is absolutely wide open and it appears at the minute that theirs is totally shut …

Fundamentally, I need to get to a table and talk to them about pay. This isn’t just me, it’s the 320,000 nurses that voted for strike action … They voted through an independent ballot that we carried out and surely to goodness you couldn’t look at one of those people this morning in the eye and say: ‘You’re not worth an extra brown penny’. In my mind they absolutely are.

I think it’s a very challenging international picture. About a third of the world’s economies are predicted to be in recession, either this year or next.

We’re no different in this country and truthfully, it is likely to get worse before it gets better, which makes it even more difficult when we have big public sector strikes going on at the moment.

Continue reading...

Aberdeenshire MP elected new SNP leader at Westminster

Posted on by

Stephen Flynn, 34, who won seat in 2019, expected to seek more independence from party’s Edinburgh leadership

An Aberdeenshire MP little known outside Scotland’s political bubble has been elected the Scottish National party’s new leader at Westminster, as the party tries to keep its independence dreams alive after a fresh vote was blocked by the supreme court.

Stephen Flynn, 34, a former city councillor who only won his seat in 2019, will face Rishi Sunak at prime minister’s questions on Wednesday after beating Glasgow Central MP Alison Thewliss, a surprise late entry into the race, to lead the UK parliament’s third biggest bloc.

Continue reading...

Senior MPs grill Jeremy Hunt on autumn statement and UK economy – live

Posted on by

The chancellor is facing questions at the Commons Treasury committee

Reed says the Scotland Act gives the Scottish parliament limited powers. It cannot legislate on reserved matters. Those include fundamental matters, including the union of the UK.

If legislation related to the union, or the UK parliament, the Scottish parliament would have no power to enact it.

Continue reading...

SNP suffers biggest ever backbench revolt over transgender bill

Posted on by

One minister resigned to vote against making it easier for transgender people in Scotland to change their legal sex

The Scottish National party suffered its largest backbench revolt in its 15 years in power over the vote on its bill making it easier for transgender people to change their legal sex, with one minister resigning in order to vote against the plans.

The community safety minister, Ash Regan, quit, prompting Nicola Sturgeon, the first minister, to accuse her of failing to raise her concerns with colleagues. Seven SNP members voted against the party whip and two abstained.

Continue reading...

To win an outright Commons majority, Labour will have to gamble

Posted on by

Surging poll numbers mean the party can dare to dream of No 10, but it’s been here before, and the path is riskier than ever

Twelve short months ago, Boris Johnson’s Conservatives were riding a vaccine bounce, and high-spirited Tory commentators were speculating about another decade in office. Now it is Labour who are buoyant, as their poll numbers surge to record highs after a disastrous mini-budget from the new Truss administration unleashed economic and political turmoil. Some in Labour now dare to dream big. Could their party rebound from the worst performance in 80 years straight to a Commons majority?

Veterans counsel caution. Labour has been burned before. Ed Miliband’s opposition posted regular big poll leads during the coalition only for these to evaporate come polling day. But history never repeats itself exactly. Unless the economic weather changes fast, the next election will be fought in the wake of inflation, recession and home repossessions. The Conservatives’ ratings on economic management are already the worst in a generation, with much of the real pain still to come. When their reputation was last torched like this, by the ERM crisis, the next result was a Labour landslide. Time to start humming Things Can Only Get Better?

Robert Ford is professor of political science at Manchester University and co-author of The British General Election of 2019

Continue reading...

Mini-budget 2022: pound crashes as chancellor cuts stamp duty and top rate of income tax – live

Posted on by

Tax cuts to cost Treasury around £37bn in 2023-24, official figures reveal

There are no urgent questions in the morning, and so Kwasi Kwarteng, the chancellor, will be delivering his statement soon after 9.30am.

The Commons starts sitting at 9.30am, but they always begin with prayers in private, and so Kwarteng will be up a few minutes later.

The last time they did it one third of the beneficiaries were people buying second homes or buy to let, so we are sceptical that this is the magic bullet to increase homeownership. What we really need to do is to build more houses and to help get people onto the property ladder by increasing the supply of housing.

When this has been done before, it has often fuelled an already hot market and many of the beneficiaries have been people buying a second or third home, rather than the first time buyers that we really want to help who are often trapped in private rented accommodation where they’re paying as much in rent every month as they would in a mortgage.

Continue reading...

Scotland school and waste service strikes called off after ‘credible’ pay offer

Posted on by

Unison, GMB and Unite suspend industrial action day after Nicola Sturgeon hosted talks

A wave of strikes across waste services and schools in Scotland has been called off after a “credible” new pay offer.

Hundreds of schools and nurseries were set to close over three days next week as support staff joined industrial action, along with a second wave of strikes by refuse workers that had already seen bins overflowing and piles of accumulated rubbish in Scotland’s major cities.

Continue reading...

Scottish refuse workers’ strike to continue as union rejects pay offer

Posted on by

Unite says offer from Scotland’s councils is unacceptable and ‘represents a waste of precious time’

Refuse workers in Scotland will continue to strike next week after the Unite union rejected the latest offer from local authorities.

Council cleansing staff across much of the country are striking over pay. A strike in Edinburgh that led to rubbish building up in the streets during the city’s festival fringe – the busiest time of year for the city – is due to end on Tuesday morning. But further action in other council areas is planned.

Continue reading...

Tory leadership: Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak clash in heated BBC debate – as it happened

Posted on by

Latest updates: final two candidates exchange blows over plans for cost of living, levelling up and China

Starmer says Labour’s approach to levelling up will be based on a practical plan, unlike the government’s.

And he says he was impressed by the approach of Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, whom he met in Berlin recently. Starmer suggests Britain could learn from the way new battery factories are located in poor regions in Germany.

There will be no magic money tree economics with us.

Continue reading...

MP Patrick Grady quits SNP after being accused of sexual assault

Posted on by

Met police say they are investigating allegations former chief whip assaulted party worker at London pub

A senior Scottish National party MP accused of sexual assault has quit the party and will sit as an independent after the Metropolitan police said they were investigating the allegations.

The Met said it had received a complaint from a third party about Patrick Grady’s alleged sexual assault of a 19-year-old party worker at the Water Poet pub on Folgate Street, London, in October 2016.

Continue reading...

New SNP sexual harassment complaints policy ‘in weeks’, say insiders

Posted on by

Exclusive: activists forcing action over ‘systemic’ failings such as handling of complaint against former chief whip Patrick Grady

A new system for dealing with sexual harassment complaints within the Scottish National party could become party policy within weeks, the Guardian has learned, after escalating criticism from activists about lack of openness and accountability.

Revelations in the past week about the scale of failings in the handling of a sexual harassment complaint against former Westminster chief whip Patrick Grady have prompted widespread frustration among SNP activists, who have been pushing for a culture change since the #MeToo movement kicked off in 2017.

Continue reading...