Thread by @theSNP

📢 @Ianblackford_MP: “Madame Deputy Speaker, the SNP is bringing forward this motion of censure against this Prime Minister because we believe in a very basic principle – and we believe the public does too.”

📢 @Ianblackford_MP: “Those in power deserve to face consequences for their disastrous actions – and they need to be held to account.

And the charge sheet against the Prime Minister is damning.”

📢 IB: “In the last few weeks alone Boris Johnson:
 
❌ ripped up anti-lobbying rules when one of his own was found guilty

❌ He is attempting to restrict the right to judicial review

❌ And he is seeking to undermine the independence of the Electoral Commission.”

📢 IB: It didn’t start there, and it definitely doesn’t end there.
 
Since coming to office, a little over two years ago, the Prime Minister has been up to his neck in scandals involving
 
💷 Cash for Honours
💷 Cash for Contracts
🤳 Texts for Tax Breaks
💷 Even Cash for Curtains

📢 IB: “And as this motion states, this is a Prime Minister who is constantly breaking the sixth Principle of Public Life – the duty to be truthful.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, month after month, scandal after scandal – the charge sheet gets longer and longer but not one single person is ever held to account.
 
If the public is to have any confidence in this place - then that needs to change today.”

📢 IB: “Because unless the Prime Minister faces consequences, unless he is censured, he won’t just think he’s gotten away with the mess he has made of the last few months.
 
He will think he can do it all over again.”

📢 IB: “And let’s be very clear - if the Prime Minister isn’t properly censured today it will also be final proof that the Tories really do believe that it’s one rule for them and one rule for everybody else.”

📢 IB: “And Madame Deputy Speaker, I would remind members opposite what we have all been witness to over the last number of weeks.
 
Because they might want to forget but the public definitely haven’t.”

📢 IB: “The Tories marched through the lobbies to undermine our parliamentary standards process, to tear up the rule books – all in order to protect a friend of the Prime Minister who was found to have broken the rules.”

📢 IB: “This whole sorry episode showed this Parliament at its very worst, and trust me, that’s saying something.”

📢 IB: “The Government Chief Whip and the Leader of the House are easy scapegoats but we all know that this was orchestrated by a Prime Minister who thinks he is untouchable, who thinks he can do as he pleases.
 
A Prime Minister who thinks he can change the rules at will.”

📢 IB: “Who believes that if the rules become inconvenient, you simply change them.
 
The question stands today - how much does it really take for Tory MPs to say enough is enough?”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, it shows you how far standards have fallen that the charges I have made against the Prime Minister aren’t even in dispute.
 
They are all matters of public record.”

📢 IB: “The Prime Minister has even admitted that in managing these scandals he personally ‘crashed the car into the ditch’.
 
It tells you all you need to know though, that he didn’t even have the decency to admit this in this House.”

IB: “He only felt the need to admit his mistakes and apologise to his backbenchers in the Tory 1922 committee, and only because they were muttering about mutiny.
 
I’m not sure that apology counts if he only did it to save his own skin.”

📢 IB: “But no matter how much the Prime Minister tries to publicly wash his hands of responsibility for his actions – the public has already cast their verdict.”

📢 IB: “The Tories may be sliding at the polls but it is as nothing compared to the hammering the Prime Minister is taking in the court of public opinion.
 
In the last week – his approval ratings have hit an all-time low. And there is one very simple reason behind it.”

📢 IB: “The public know that that the Prime Minister is at the rotten core of all these scandals.”

📢 IB: “A natural comparison has been drawn with the Major government in the early 1990’s but even that comparison fails to properly get to the scale of corruption that has occurred – much of it in plain sight.”

📢 IB: “The difference between this Prime Minister and John Major was that Major took action to address the sleaze and corruption.
 
This Prime Minister is at the centre of the sleaze and corruption - he is orchestrating much of it.”

📢 IB: “And I’m afraid corruption is the only proper word, the only honest word, for what has been going on.”

📢 IB: “As I said at the weekend, the leader of the opposition, and I do wonder where they are, is now very fond of repeating the line that when it comes to the Prime Minister ‘the joke isn’t funny anymore’.”

📢 IB: “But in truth it was never funny, and we are all now living with the consequences of having a man like this in Downing Street.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, I think it is also important to reflect on just how damaging recent weeks and months have been in terms of the public’s faith in politics.”

📢 IB: “Because each and every one of these scandals erodes standards, erodes trust and ultimately erodes democracy itself.”

📢 IB: “In the middle of the Owen Paterson scandal, the Prime Minister said and I quote:”

‘I genuinely believe that the UK is not remotely a corrupt country and I genuinely think that our institutions are not corrupt.’

📢 IB: “The problem for the Prime Minister is that the public disagree with him.
 
A recent Savanta:ComRes found that 54% of those asked think the UK government is corrupt.
 
And if he wants to know why – he need only look in the mirror.”

📢 IB: “In the eyes of the public, this is a UK government that has normalised sleaze and is now trying to normalise corruption.
 
This is the Tory government’s attempt at a new normal, where no one is held responsibility, no one is held to account and no one ever, ever resigns.”

📢 IB:“But that is exactly why consequences are so important and why this censure motion matters.
 
Because it can only ever become a new normal if we all put up with it.”

📢 IB: “You know this is a debate that matters to people in the United Kingdom.

And we can hear the behaviour and the cat calling from members opposite and it sums up this attempt to shut down democracy, to shut down our right to raise these important issues.”

📢 IB: “But of course, that new normal has only become possible if we don’t hold the government to account and don’t make them answer for their corruption.”

📢 IB: “So, I would genuinely ask members from across the House.
 
If they have any interest in maintaining some dignity and decency in public life – they should finally hold this Prime Minister to account and censure him for his abuse of power.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, let’s take one example of that abuse of power – the cash for honours scandal:
 
15 of the Tory party’s main treasurers who happened to hand over £3million to the party were somehow given life peerages to the House of Lords.”

📢 IB: “Twenty-two of the Tory party’s top financial backers have all happened to have been given peerages since 2010.
 
In total – this group has stuffed Tory party coffers with £54 million.”

📢 IB: “You know this sums it up. The Conservatives see it as a virtue that if you give multi-million pounds to the Conservative party then you end up in House of Lords.

My goodness, what a disgrace to democracy.”

📢 IB: “Let’s take Lord Cruddas, a leading donor to the Vote Leave campaign and who bankrolled, let’s not forget, bankrolled the Prime Minister’s Conservative leadership bid.
 
He personally gave up to £4 million in total donations to the Tory party and affiliates.”

📢 IB: “His reward? An ermine robe and a seat in the Lords.
 
And what’s worse, the Prime Minister personally overruled the House of Lords Appointments Committee who advised against his appointment.

The very first time the watchdog’s recommendation has ever been ignored.”

📢 IB: “Three days after he was introduced in the Lords, what happened?
 
Lord Cruddas handed £500,000 to Conservative central office.
 
Now, I will gladly give way if anyone on the Tory benches wants to stand up and justify that level of sleaze.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, what I am reflecting on is the behaviour of the Prime Minister that puts members in the House of Lords.

When the House of Lords appointments committee have rule against the appointment.”

📢 IB: “And of course, I’ve given the opportunity for anyone on the Tory benches who wishes to rise and defend the actions of putting Tory Donors, £3 million donations, what a price to be able to undermine our democracy.”

📢 IB: “What we are talking about is corruption and sleeze.

We’re talking about a Prime Minister that forces Conservative MP’s to go through to the lobbies to get one of their own off a charge against parliamentary standards.”

📢 IB: “We’re talking about a Prime Minister who rewards those who give money to the Conservative Party.

I can say that’s exactly a subject which is important to the people of Scotland.”

📢 IB: Madame Deputy Speaker, there is another important point to made about how deeply damaging all of these scandals are.
 
Every day that the Prime Minister spends concentrating on how he will somehow avoid scrutiny, is a day spent not doing the basics of what his job demands.

📢 IB: “And it’s also becoming clearer just how damaging and dangerous it is that chaotic governance now defines Downing Street.”

📢 IB: “That would be bad enough in normal times, but it is totally unforgivable in the middle of a pandemic.  
 
Because in the real world away from the shambles in Number 10 people are not only suffering from the pandemic, they are suffering from a Tory cost of living crisis.”

📢 IB: “Inflation is running at 5%.
 
Rising day to day costs and rising household bills is the main focus for families.”

📢 IB: “And while all of these political stories on sleaze have been going on and taking up time at Downing Street – the political decision to cut Universal Credit is hitting homes hardest.”

📢 IB: “The shameful cut to universal credit wasn’t just the wrong policy, it came at the worst possible time for families this winter.
 
So, we are left with a UK government not only up to its neck in sleaze but hitting families at the same time.”

📢 IB: “In Scotland, I am proud that we have a First Minister who understands the pressures family finances are under, and a government that listens and responds.”

📢 IB: “I am proud that - at the very same time that Westminster is cutting Universal Credit by £20 a week:

The SNP Scottish Government is raising the Scottish Child Payment by £20 a week.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, I think one of public’s real angers about these scandals is the deep dishonesty that has been so openly on display.
 
The truth and the Prime Minister have always been strangers.”

📢 IB: And let me just take a few examples:
 
On the 4th of March 2020, the Prime Minister said ‘We have restored the nurses’ bursary’ – completely and factually untrue.

📢 IB: On the 17th of June 2020, the Prime Minister there were 400,000 ‘fewer families living in poverty now than there were in 2010’.

Both ONS and the Children’s Commissioner have confirmed that is false.

📢 IB: On 7th November 2019, the Prime Minister told Northern Ireland businesses – in person - that the protocol would mean ‘No forms, no checks, no barriers of any kind’ – once again, completely untrue.

📢 IB: “Now Madame Deputy Speaker, it right to be careful in terms of the language we use in this house.
 
But when it comes to language - it is also right to be accurate and honest.”

📢 IB: “And on the basis of all the evidence, I can only conclude that the Prime Minister has repeatedly broken the sixth principle of public life.
 
I can only conclude that the Prime Minister has demonstrated himself to be liar.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, let me finish on this point.
 
I think there is a misguided sense on the Tory benches that they have gotten past the scandals of the last few weeks.”

📢 IB: “The Prime Minister thinks that if he blunders on people might not forgive, but they will forget.
 
Not for the first time, the Tories are badly wrong and badly out of touch.”

📢 IB: “Because they just don’t get that the depth of anger amongst the public is very real and it isn’t going away.”

📢 IB: “I know that people in Scotland are looking on at a broken Westminster system that has never felt more remote, arrogant and corrupt.”

📢 IB: I was dealing with the sixth principal of public life and what I’ve done is I’ve given three examples, and I could have given many more, where the Prime Minister hasn’t told the truth.

📢 IB: Now I regret, in the context of where we are, that ain’t had to make the point that I did because it’s important.

If we undermine honesty and truth in this place then what are we left with?

📢 IB: And that is why we have brought the motion that we have tonight.

And that’s what I’m asking honourable members across this house to reflect on because there is overwhelming evidence that the Prime Minister has broken that principle of public life.

📢 IB: And I’m asking each and every member of this House, particularly those on the government benches, to examine their conscious on the basis of the evidence.

And think very carefully before they go through the lobbies tonight.

📢 IB: “Because the public are angry about what has happened in this place.

That the member that I mentioned earlier had been sanctioned by the standards committee that the Prime Minister sought to get off.”

📢 IB: “And there will come a time when the public will judge this House. And this House tonight should reflect very, very carefully on that.”

📢 IB: I would say to Honourable and Right Honourable members opposite, that they are being let down, we are being let down.

These islands are being let down.

By a Prime Minister that doesn’t know how to behave.

📢 IB: “And on that note, let’s just say that it will be very interesting to see how the Scottish Tories vote tonight.

And we will watching.”

📢 IB: “A group of course who never fail to see conspiracy at Holyrood but somehow always fall deathly silent when it comes to sleaze and corruption overseen by their own Prime Minister.”

📢 IB: “But in truth this isn’t about the Scottish Tories I’ll leave them to explain their own hypocrisy.
 
It’s about what the public expects when standards and rules are so clearly broken by their political representatives.”

📢 IB: “They expect consequences and they expect this censure.
 
But let’s also be very clear about this.
 
If we fail to censure this Prime Minister today – we will have failed that public demand for accountability”

📢 IB: “And not only that - it will reveal something very telling.
 
It will show a Westminster system that is broken beyond repair.
 
It will a show Prime Minister who believes himself to be above the law of the land.”

📢 IB: “The only comfort I take is that fewer people in Scotland can possibly look at the broken, corrupt, self-serving Westminster system and conclude that it provides a secure basis for the future of Scotland.
 
Because we all know Scotland can do much better than this.”

📢 IB: “Madame Deputy Speaker, We can do better than this broken Westminster system and we can do so much better than this Prime Minister.
 
We will do so much better when we choose independence.
 
I propose the motion in the name of myself, and right honourable colleagues.”