What happened in the House of Commons tonight?

[Bookridden]

I'm struggling to understand what is going on and would be grateful is someone can explain to me in simple terms.

Why were Labour worried about the safety of MPs?

Why were the SNP unhappy?

Why were the Tories unhappy?

What's likely to happen next?

Are MPs who don't take a Pro-Palestinian stance really putting their lives at risk?

Innit.

How quickly they forget.

Is it so difficult to believe that MPs are having their inboxes flooded by constituents horrified and disgusted by what they are seeing happening in Gaza? One MP highlighted witness accounts of children witnessing their parents bleeding to death in front of them, of seeing their siblings in pieces.
Israel's actions have repercussions throughout the world. It's no wonder MPs are debating it.

If the Tories hadn't withdrawn their amendment, then we wouldn't have seen the descent into chaos tonight. One has to ask why they withdrew it.

I can understand that though it still seems rather pointless. However, a motion was passed calling for a humanitarian ceasefire wasn't it?

I feel incredibly sorry for the speaker. I think he thought everyone wanted a ceasefire and would pull together as it’s such an important vote. He essentially gave everyone what they wanted with those amendments. Now he is being blamed because they acted like toddlers. A disgrace really.

Why? It was the government’s amendment.

Do you think the government should just allow a motion and an amendment both of which it opposes?

I’ve just read that apparently over 70% of the public now support a ceasefire. The US is now taking a stronger stance with Israel hence labour/Tory changing their tune. God forbid our politicians could think for themselves!

Yes, though the SNP wanted wording that condemned Israel for actions tantamount to genocide. For obvious reasons this is a personal as well as professional stance for Humza Yousaf.

Aside from the snub, they won't be happy with what will be seen as a wishy washy compromise rather than a strong censoring position.

Why would they not allow the democratic voting to take place?

I'm sure I read that the tories have now suggested challenging his seat at the next election.

Both amendments had quite significant tone and position differences with the original motion, but I struggle to see why Labour wouldn't support the government amendment without raising their own? I'll need to read them again since its annoying me.

He gave Labour what they wanted - outside the rules. He didn’t allow anyone else to debate on the terms expected.

Parliamentary procedure is intended to allow parties to establish where parties stand and to embarrass governments. Labour have been very good at that in the past. What happened today is absolutely shameful.

Exactly as if it’s not more to do with Yousaf’s strong position for obvious reasons over Starmer’s own problem

This Speaker has always been totally out of his depth, and as my older son says 'such a wet lettuce'. Time for him to go.

But the Tories knew their amendment would be selected and they would vote for their ceasefire amendment so didn't need to go to Hoyle with concerns about not being able to vote for it?

I think Hoyle saying that they couldn't have a vote at all on the SNP motion would have been impossible given that it was a day specifically for them to be able to table a motion of their choice.

Why would you not think that threats against Labour MPs were genuine? Not sure why you are trying to downplay these threats given the murders of Jo Cox and Sir David Amess. A man was arrested within the last couple of weeks for threats against Mike Freer.

And Sir Lindsay Hoyle has cited MP safety as the reason he was persuaded to allow both amendments.

The Tory bots are out in force on here, working hard guys!

The idea that the conservatives can try and make hay out of this when they are repeatedly trying to break international law (Rwanda for a start).
I couldn't give a toss about 'convention' when actually we need our governments to come out and declare that what's happening in Gaza is unacceptable and keep putting the pressure on the Israelis to do everything they can to stop their government in its homicidal quest

Re SNP Yes… but I doubt that it would take long to find examples of all parties playing similar games.

I assume the danger is from constituents who would be angry that Labour MPs seemed to be voting against a ceasefire?

There was really very little difference in the SNP wording and labours amendment. It wouldn’t have killed them to just shut up and get behind it this once, but of course they want to embarrass the Labour Party. Don’t think they came across well at all.

If so small Labour could just vote on the original rather than use the speaker as they did

Labour bots you mean. Starmer can do no wrong

😂😂 must remember that one

They could- but Labour are likely to be the party of the next government and so it makes sitting down with the Israelis (which they will have to do in some way) pretty difficult if you've just said they're genocidal, while trying to shake off long-running anti-semitism accusations. The SNP don't have to worry about that because they're not going to be in government.

Starmer is a zionist so he would not be able to support the SNP motion wording.

If there was so little difference, why did Labour want the rules bent for them then?

I get that there’s a futility in all this because Israel isn’t going to care either way (which is why I suspect Starmer has been furiously reassuring Israel of his support behind the scenes) but perverting the role of Speaker and monkeying with process is quite something.

This is nonsense. One had wording that acknowledges Israel is committing war crimes and the other doesn't. That is no small difference.

Here's the crowd outside parliament tonight calling for an intifada (previous intifadas have involved lots of killing and violent attacks) and also supporting Houthi terrorists in attacking international shipping.

https://x.com/koshercockney/status/1760424933203587211?s=61&t=U9XrcF693-JpMxeIueYG7g

I wouldn't want to walk out of parliament through that lot having abstained from a ceasefire vote, would you?