To be embarrassed by our politicians?

[domineastronomy]

What an absolute shambles in the Commons this evening.
Voting on Gaza was secondary to pathetic game playing and point scoring.

Adding I do think he will resign because the number of votes against him doesn't seem to be rising further after last night.

This is certainly true, the paranoia about possible accusations of anti semitism is off the scale!

As for all the “it doesn’t make any difference what UK says” comments, actually the more Countries that publicly state they do not support the continuation of the bombing campaign by Israel the better. Israel need to hear loud and clear that they have lost support, but it needs to be backed up by actions too. Not sending money or weapons to them might be a start!

I think it's pretty obvious. Labour saw a huge backlash from its own back benchers over the last vote on Gaza. Hoyle, a Labour MP, wanted to avoid the same again, this not acting impartially. Neither is having a private meeting with Starmer immediately before selecting which amendments to accept. Whether or not Starmer suggested he could only support him as speaker after election, as has been claimed, we will never know. However the Speaker was unwise to have that private meeting as should have foresaw the fallout when he changed age old presidents in Labours favour after the meeting. Labour had to flip flop because in many large urban areas Muslims are either fielding their own Muslim independent candidates or threatening to do so, who will vote how many Muslims want them to vote on Gaza. Labour are afraid it would reduce their own majority. I think Hoyle is no longer a credible impartial speaker and I think he needs to go.

As was said by the political correspondent on LBC yesterday it was purely to do with domestic politics and an attempt by the SNP and tories to cause issues for the Labour Party. Nothing less. In reality they give not a shit about the Palestinians or the hostages. Pure desperate politicking.

You're not missing anything

Meaningless virtue signalling

A pp said it was an important vote. I think in real life, what's happening in Gaza is pretty far down normal people's list of priorities

Over 50 MPs in a no confidence vote now...

The last speaker who resigned did so at 27 votes against him. Hoyle has 33 including 5/6 of the influential 1922 committee. Many MPs are not in parliament as many bank benchers leave after Wednesday for constituencies. I think more signatures will follow. Several other MPs have threatened to vote against Hoyle if he doesn't resign by the weekend.

It's inevitable. Hoyle broke impartiality rules to favour Labour. He needs to go.

Starmer caused this if Hoyle goes

Manipulating process to save his arse

Just out of interest, what is your position on the Tory backlash from its own backbenchers on the same vote?

The Tories hold a significant majority. If they were very bothered about the precedent (and it isn’t unprecedented nor again the rule of the HoC) they could have voted the labour amendment down and continued to table their own amendment. Which would have kept the precedent.

The Labour Party actually managed to pass their own amendment because their backbenchers are happy with it. The Tories had to withdraw theirs because they weren’t confident they could win a vote on it.

This whole debacle looks like three bald men fighting over a comb. The UK's influence in global affairs is now marginal at best. That's nothing to do with Brexit, the EU itself has almost no influence.

Countries in the Middle East and China are the ones now in the driving seat. Their increasing influence over British affairs should be welcomed in Westminster. It's exactly what many UK politicians have been fighting for through a combination of incompetence and stealth.

Does this not scare the shit out of people?
I understand politicians have different political views how to support economy etc.
But this seems to suggest that some politicians views are based purely on religious grounds. Perhaps someone can name a country where men govern on religious views that actually treat women as equals.

I was just about to start a similar thread. Absolutely shameful, self serving, self centred, blind arrogance. To think that this debate has anything to do with party politics is disgusting. Even after the whole debacle yesterday, Penny Mordant this morning has had a pop at a member of the Labour Party, which has nothing to do with the debate and everything to do with pathetic party politics.

If any of them read this thread. Grow up. My 6 year old is more mature than you lot.

Speak for yourself.

I think the votes yesterday were about pointless politicking, but the tragedy in Gaza certainly isn't far down my list of priorities.

I think a lot of people across the political spectrum do care deeply about what's going on in Gaza, but the farce in Parliament yesterday had nothing to do with that, it was purely about domestic politics.

Starmer has shown he has no qualms bending rules for his own gain, just like the Tories.
It's like picking between Pepsi or Coke

Exactly. It suited the government perfectly to walk out last night because they weren't confident of getting their own amendment through anyway. There is a great deal of confected anger against Lindsay Hoyle today because that suits their narrative. Meanwhile, the SNP are just pissed off because their deliberate attempt to humiliate Starmer didn't work.

CherrySocks · Yesterday 22:24
**
It's been a long time since any prominent politician has shown real leadership or even any maturity”

It has. I’ve found myself lamenting the loss of people like Ken Clarke and Michael Heseltine recently and I’m a Labour voter!

Compared to actual statespeople of yesteryear, the current rabble, all parties, is an embarrassment to the UK.

If John Smith hadn’t passed so young or David Miliband had won over his brother, or Rory Stewart over Johnson, I suspect the nation would be in a very different and better place now. As it is, I can’t think of a single, competent person of any party. Johnson and Cummings put paid to them. What a bloody mess we’re in.

Only if you don’t give a shit about process

Urging the speaker to change the rules because you are weak and can’t face s rebellion is fucked up

My understanding is that Hoyle was concerned about the safety and security of individual MPs.

Honestly, I give more of a shit about that than I do about process. Threats and violence against MPs are a far greater threat to our democracy than a slight change in parliamentary process.

Oh, and he didn't change any "rules" - he broke with precedent. Not quite the same thing.

Of course, if Starmer pressured him for party political reasons and Hoyle caved in, then that would be a failure to act impartially and both Starmer and Hoyle would be at fault. I haven’t seen any actual evidence though that that's what actually happened.

Did you miss the part where Starmer leant on him?

You do know that they met and Starmer urged him to change the process?

MPs get threats all the time if all it takes is Starmer in the speaker’s ear every time to avoid his huge issue on this then we may as well throw the keys to the threatening mob

Starmer was clearly facing a large rebellion and used Hoyle to get out of it

I thought the marches were 'peaceful'? Threats to our politicians don't exactly come across that way.

I didn't miss the claims that Starmer leant on him. What's the evidence for this exactly? I'm aware that they met, but do we have any concrete evidence about what was said at that meeting? Very happy to review my position if there is clear proof but not interested in mere speculation from people with agendas of their own.

And yes, MPs do get threats all the time. I take their safety and security seriously, regardless of which party they belong to. I expect the speaker to do the same. We have had two MP murders in recent years. One of them - Jo Cox - was a friend of mine back in the day. We have seen other MPs resign recently due to concerns about how the security threats are impacting on their families. Others with protesters targeting their family homes. Others citing threats made towards members of their families. There are MPs on both sides of the house who are genuinely fearful for their own lives and for their families. How on earth can we ever attract the brightest and the best into our political system with this level of threat hanging over people?

You might be able to shrug all of that off in favour of maintaining established parliamentary precedents, but Lindsay Hoyle seems to have reached the conclusion that a minor change in process was justified in order to reduce the risks. Obviously, he didn't foresee the fact that the Tories and the SNP were going to throw their toys out of the pram and derail things to that extent...a miscalculation on his part for which he must take responsibility, of course. But I have not seen anything yet that persuades me that he was doing this for party political reasons. I believe him when he says that he thought he was doing what was needed to try and keep people safe.

From Starmer on the meeting with Hoyle

"I simply urged to ensure that we have the broadest possible debate.”

He shouldn’t be urging the speaker to change process to avoid a stark rebellion in his own party

I don't see how that constitutes evidence of anything. Urging the speaker to ensure the broadest possible debate doesn't amount to pressuring the speaker to change process in Labour's favour. Nor does that alone seem likely to be what swayed Lindsay Hoyle to act as he did.

Honestly, if that's all you've got, I am more confident than I was before that Hoyle's reasoning was prompted by factors other than Starmer's intervention.

I think the Tories withdrew from the vote along with the SNP party because they saw Hoyle going against parliamentary precedents to favour the Labour party because it looked like they might be split over the SNP. Hoyle has now admitted to parliament he made the wrong decision and felt under pressure because Labour MP's were afraid to vote on SNP policy. Very dangerous for democracy when parliament is afraid of thugs outside protesting.