A View from Westminster

At the time of writing we had received the Privileges Committee’s report into Boris Johnson’s misconduct and were waiting to discuss its findings. By the time you read this you’ll know if Parliament agreed with the conclusion that Johnson had repeatedly lied as Prime Minister and then made it worse by his shameful behaviour towards the committee that Parliament had set up. Mr Johnson of course took the coward’s way out. Despite blustering on about it being for the whole House of Commons to decide he then ran away and resigned his seat rather than let the House do just that. It tells you everything you need to know about the state of much of British politics that people are actually discussing how and when he might be able to get back into Parliament.

The former Prime Minister’s “honours” list was anything but honourable. It’s fair enough for anyone who has held high public office to want to recognise people especially those who have done a good job for the public behind the scenes. That’s not what Boris Johnson did. He handed out lordships and knighthoods to his pals and supporters including one who was responsible for illegally shutting down parliament and one who had to resign from a senior political position because he was caught in his own lockdown party scandal. None of these people should have been allowed an “honour”.

I had a busy day of surgeries in various parts of the constituency last week. Thanks to everyone who came along and to the wonderful Serendipi-tea café who kept us fed! My constituency team are working hard to follow up all the new cases we picked up from constituents.

One of the highlights of my time as an MP was a visit to Parliament by a group of 40 senior students from Auchmuty High School. I’ve had visits from schools and other groups before but this was the first time such a big group had been able to visit at a time I could join them. As well as the “official” programme organised by Parliament’s Education Centre we managed to get them into one of the official committee rooms for a longer Question and Answer session. I hope they found it interesting although with the temperature around 30 degrees we were all pretty wabbit by that time. A big thank you to Mrs Jackson and her colleagues who I know had been planning this visit for almost a full school year.

The Scottish Government has published a report setting out why Scotland lie almost every democratic country should have a written constitution agreed by its citizens. This could for example give guarantees about the right of access to free health care, workers’ rights to take industrial action, the right to non violent protest and the right to live free from discrimination and prejudice. All of these are under threat as Britain continues its descent into a more autocratic state. The only way to protect these rights for ourselves and for future generations is through Independence.