Ian Byrne
MP for Liverpool West Derby · Labour · United Kingdom
“In the years after Hillsborough, one question followed me everywhere. It is a question every survivor knows—every survivor of Grenfell knows it; every survivor of a public disaster knows it.”
“Then came the chant that echoed around the stadium: “Justice. Justice. Justice.” Not because it was a slogan, but because it was all we had left. For two decades we had been lied to, families had been ignored, survivors had been smeared.”
“The families, the survivors and the people of Liverpool will never forgive those who deliberately vilified innocent people and orchestrated that cover-up. They will never forget what Rupert Murdoch, Kelvin MacKenzie, The Sun , Norman Bettison and South Yorkshire police did not only to the victims and survivors, but to an entire city.”
“Truth without justice leaves a wound only partially healed. The families deserved justice. The survivors deserved justice. We never got it for Hillsborough. Then, Bishop James Jones gave us not just a report, but a warning that should echo through every public institution in Britain: “The patronising disposition of unaccountable power”.”
“Back in 2015, I had the number 96 tattooed on my wrist. It was not simply a tattoo; it was a promise. It was a promise that whenever life became difficult, I would never forget one simple truth: I was one of the lucky ones. I walked away from Hillsborough, but 96 did not. Today we remember the 97.”
“The Hillsborough law was born from that understanding. Its purpose is simple: never again should a grieving family have to fight the state simply to discover the truth. In 2021 I was asked by my friend, now my right hon.”
The complete record
Every one of 602 lines we hold for Ian Byrne, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 12 of 13.
“The situation is grim. This Government’s decade of brutal and unrelenting austerity has cut our public services to the bone and forced people who deliver those services into abject poverty. One in six people in my constituency are missing meals or going without food, and that includes many civil servants. In a PCS survey of its members, 35% of respondents said that they had skipped meals because they had no food, 18% that they have had to miss work because they cannot afford transport or fuel to get there, 85% that the cost of living crisis has affected their physical and mental health, and 52% that they are worried about losing their homes as bills and inflation rocket.”
“Workers in the civil service have not had a real-terms pay rise for over 11 years. Salaries have fallen by between 12% and 23% in real terms at each grade since 2010. There would be an uproar among MPs if that happened to them. There has been a sustained pay cut—a disgraceful pay injustice that has resulted in the loss of at least £2,800 a year in pay to individual civil servants. The pay structures across the civil service are fragmented into over 200 bargaining units, a system that the FDA trade union has rightly described as “dysfunctional and broken”. That broken system has resulted not only in low pay but in wide variations of pay across the service, equal pay issues and a gender pay gap, as well as a recruitment and retention crisis. On top of that, civil servants have been overpaying pension contributions by £500 a year since 2019.”
“It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Pritchard. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter), who is a good friend, for securing this important debate, and for her excellent speech. I hope I have pronounced her constituency right, or she will kill me. Although I have no formal interests to declare, I am a proud member of the PCS parliamentary group. I stand in full solidarity with the civil service in Liverpool, West Derby, and across the country, who are taking industrial action as a last resort over their pay, pensions and job security. It was an absolute privilege to stand with civil servants on an historic day at the PCS picket line in Whitehall last month, with quite a number of colleagues from this side of the House. It is a position they should never have been put in.”
“T10. Some 30% of disabled people, including many of my constituents, are having to cut back on using essential medical equipment at home due to rising energy bills. Some 70,000 people have signed the charity Sense’s petition calling for long-term ongoing support for disabled people and their families. Will the Secretary of State deliver that support as a matter of urgency?”
“We are talking about communities struggling. A report last week said that the minimum universal credit paid should be £120. We have got people receiving £85, so they are already down before we even factor in the rent. Does the hon. Gentleman understand the magnitude of the crisis that people are facing now regarding rent, food and the cost of everything? Is that coming through in his constituency? It is certainly coming through in mine, and it is certainly coming through in the national picture as well. We have got to understand and quantify the magnitude of the problem. Also, how do we solve it politically? It is not by saying that someone should be able to afford a Weetabix and a pint of milk. How do we solve the problem of millions of people going hungry?”
“Last year, Henry Dimbleby gave the Government a national food strategy, which took around four years to complete. That is there; the Government have got that. That’s your food strategy.”
“The demonisation of those in food poverty is an act of political cowardice by an Administration bereft of ideas to solve the problem, and lacking humanity toward the millions who are suffering and looking to the Government to lift them up and not punch them down. If reliance on charity alone was considered a sufficient guarantee for basic human needs in the UK, previous generations would not have legislated for universal state schooling and a national health service. The current horrific situation demonstrates that we need the same vision and ambition when it comes to food security. It cannot wait a moment longer.”
“I am so happy that he is sorting out universal free school meals and introducing them in London for all primary school children, which is an essential part of the right to food. It is a fantastic move forwards, but it is clear that our communities are in crisis at the moment. I pay tribute to all the workers taking industrial action in defence of their communities, including the teaching staff in West Derby, who were out on the picket line yesterday. The 17% rise in the price of food is the biggest rise since 1977 and comes alongside the sharpest fall in wages since 1977. Food inflation up, wages down—do the maths. It is really important to look across the piece at how people are being demonised.”
“It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I thank the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) for securing the debate, and for his certainly interesting take on tackling food poverty. I want to make it clear at the outset that the catastrophe of hunger and poverty in our communities is the result of political choices made by this Government. If a Government cannot ensure that everyone has enough to eat—and not just to eat, but to thrive—they are a Government that is fundamentally broken. The time for sticking plasters is surely over. We need to legislate for a right to food and enforceable food rights, and to ensure that the Government of today are held accountable for the cost of food and ensuring nobody goes hungry. I pay credit to Mayor Sadiq Khan.”
“Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood, which is ready to go, and work with us to bring the Hillsborough law—including a fully independent public advocate—into legislation?”
“I welcome the Secretary of State’s acknowledgement that we need to legislate for an independent public advocate, but I am sorry to say that today’s announcement is a pale imitation of what Hillsborough families and survivors spent years campaigning on. The Government’s proposal feels like a weak signposting service. It does not have any of the powers that a truly independent public advocate would require—it feels so weak. For me, the key question is whether this proposal would have stopped the state cover-ups of Hillsborough, the contaminated blood scandal and so many other cover-ups over the ages, and whether it will prevent further cover-ups. Unfortunately, I have to say that the answer is no, so will the Secretary of State instead adopt the Bill tabled by my right hon.”
“The investigation panel concludes that the “overarching organisational failures” by UEFA and the French authorities were at the root of what went so terribly wrong that evening.”
“Please don’t let them do this, make them take responsibility and please ensure that lessons are learned for the safety of all future sporting fans.” That is why this report matters so much to so many people. Eight months since it was commissioned by the general secretary of UEFA, the report into what really happened at the UEFA champions league final in Paris on 28 May has finally been published. To my eternal relief and to the relief of thousands of Liverpool and Real Madrid supporters who experienced the horror that evening, it is a world away from the UEFA-led cover-up that we saw on the evening of 28 May. The report places the blame correctly and firmly at the doorstep of those responsible for the game, which could have led to countless lives being lost. The report is clear: the fans bear no culpability.”
“Instead, I was met with complete disorganisation, aggressive and violent policing which resulted in my being kettled and ultimately bounced along a line of riot shields of Parisian police officers. Thirty-three years ago, I escaped a life-threatening crush at Hillsborough and now I faced a situation where one slip or trip and I could have again witnessed deaths at a football match. These things happen. People make mistakes and they need to learn from them, only here, again, I had to observe the police and authorities invent a pack of lies as they tried to pass the blame onto innocent people rather than take responsibility for their own failings. Thirty-three years ago, the police did all they could to fabricate a false narrative and here we are with the French authorities doing exactly the same.”
““Due to the late arrival of fans, the match has been delayed.” That was the message on a screen in Stade de France that made so many of us feel physically ill when we saw it. Lies were once again relayed to a watching world after so many of us had just experienced our worst day in football since Hillsborough, all because of the disgraceful organisation by UEFA and the French authorities. We knew immediately that another cover-up was in motion. After all, we had been here before. I was sent this by Nick Braley, a Hillsborough survivor: “As a Hillsborough survivor, I naively expected the policing to be focused on safety, especially given Paris’s history of terrorist attacks, including one at the Stade de France just a few years ago.”
“I beg to move, That this House has considered the findings of the independent review report on the UEFA Champions League Final 2022. It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Ms Harris. I declare that I am a proud member of the Spirit of Shankly football union. I want to start by paying tribute to the magnificent efforts of the Liverpool supporters who saved lives through their actions in Paris. They also fought for the truth regarding the events that took place there and refused to be beaten by the lies and smears of UEFA and the French Government, which were straight from the Hillsborough playbook. We need to remember that this could have happened to any set of fans in Europe.”
“I completely agree with the hon. Gentleman. The report exonerates Liverpool supporters of any blame or responsibility. In fact, it backs up the statements made by so many supporters, including myself, when I stated that if it were not for the efforts and understanding of the Liverpool supporters that night, people would have died because of the failings of UEFA and the French authorities. I thank the chair of the panel, Dr Tiago Brandão Rodrigues, and the members of the panel: Mr Ronan Evain, Ms Amanda Jacks, Mr Frank Paauw, Mr Daniel Ribeiro, Mr Kenny Scott, Mr Luís Silva, Professor Clifford Stott and Mr Pete Weatherby.”
“UEFA and the authorities also sought to deflect responsibility; the report highlights that “The public response of UEFA in the aftermath of the problems on the night and in its subsequent evidence to the Senate was striking in its orientation to protect itself.””
“It is inexcusable for a major police force to base its operational strategy for policing a huge global event—including the use of tear gas and pepper spray on innocent supporters and its failure to protect supporters from local gangs—on old smears and lies. To date, there has been no apology or acknowledgment of its errors. Without that, how can anyone have confidence in the ability of Paris to safely hold a global sporting event again? UEFA presented to the French Senate inquiry a completely misleading view of what it knew of safety problems at previous events at Stade de France. That was unacceptable.”
“So many have contributed, but I personally thank David Conn, Dan Austin and Rob Draper in the UK and Pierre Etienne Minonzio from L’Equipe . What a difference it made to have excellent journalists who sought to find the truth—unlike in 1989, when the gutter press printed lies and smears. The panel report pinpointed many organisational failures, but I will reflect on some of the most damning. The UEFA model for organising was defective, in that there was “an absence of overall control or oversight of safety and security.” That is an astounding failure, for which those responsible must be held accountable. The French policing operational strategy was based on the lies and smears of the Hillsborough disaster.”
“I agree 100% with my right hon. Friend, unsurprisingly. I thank the panel for their diligence and tenacity in seeking the truth and laying the foundation for justice. Their work is beyond reproach, and they collectively deserve the thanks of every single football supporter in Europe, because, when implemented, their recommendations will make the European game safer for all. The importance of supporters leading the fight for the truth to be laid bare in the report is incalculable, but this was a truly collective effort. I place on record my thanks to Liverpool football club and Professor Phil Scraton for pulling together witness statements to inform the panel and for their ceaseless support. Thanks must also go to the many journalists across the world who have done so much to aid the quest for truth.”
“Joe Blott said: “UEFA and all authorities must now accept all 21 recommendations cited in the report and act upon them. They must apologise for the lies and smears they used to shift responsibility from themselves to innocent fans and they must formally retract the untrue statements made about supporters. UEFA must ensure that this never happens again and do everything in their power to enable all supporters to attend football matches secure in the knowledge that their safety is paramount and will not be compromised.””
“Absolutely. I thank my hon. Friend and I will touch on that point in a minute, because we have the fantastic Ted Morris from the Liverpool Disabled Supporters Association in the room. The report states: “It was a serious error for UEFA to assume it could avoid accountability for a foreseeable near disaster at its flagship event”. That statement is utterly damning. Now that we have the report, what happens next? Two of the foremost campaigners for the truth about Paris are Joe Blott, the chair of the Spirit of Shankly and the Liverpool Supporters Board, and Ted Morris, from the Liverpool Disabled Supporters Association. They are clear about what should happen next. I am proud to have Ted Morris sitting in the room with us.”
“The impact of the actions of UEFA and the French authorities cannot be overestimated, but we must hope that lessons have finally been learned, and that no supporter will ever have to go through what we did. That would be a fitting legacy for the many who suffered that night in Paris.”
“We need the FA to provide leadership and show courage to ensure that our demands regarding Paris are met in the halls of UEFA. The FA must heed the findings of the report and act upon them, for the sake of English football and its supporters. I urge the Government to keep the political pressure on President Macron and Aleksander Čeferin of UEFA to ensure a full apology is made and that the report’s recommendations are met. The Government have a duty to Liverpool supporters and to all football supporters in the UK to ensure that this never happens again. Nothing can erase the dreadful events of that night in Paris. We know of at least two Hillsborough survivors who have taken their own lives since Paris, with thousands of others traumatised.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for that point, which is painted clearly in the report. I wholeheartedly agree with everything she just said. Ted Morris says: “We do not seek recrimination or blame; that is for others to address. We do, though, ask UEFA to take on board the panel recommendations and make the necessary adjustments to allow disabled supporters to follow their chosen team in Europe, without having to overcome so much prejudice and navigate to so many hurdles.” I want to finish by asking the Football Association, which abandoned Liverpool supporters in 1989, not to back the vested interests of UEFA, but instead to back the interests of supporters. As our representative at UEFA, in 2023 the FA must save the game and its supporters.”
“I thank the Minister for his response to far. I impress on him the importance, whoever ends up in that final—I hope it is Liverpool—of fans having a voice in the shape of that final and proper engagement. They are the ones who go to matches and have the experience, and they do not get listened to enough. We did not get listened to in Paris, and our voices are often not heard, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) mentioned. It is important that the Government commit to ensuring that, whoever is in that final, the supporters will be sat down at the organisational table and listened to.”
“Like many others, I am heartbroken following the incidents in Knowsley. I stand in this Chamber as a proud product of immigration: my ancestors fled the great hunger in Ireland, as did those of so many of my fellow Scousers, which is why these events have caused such shock in Liverpool. This is a wake-up call for those of us who want a society in which all are welcome. The words and the tone of hon. Members in this place and the media matter hugely, so will the Government commit themselves to ensuring that there is an end to the hateful rhetoric that demonises and dehumanises people? Will they put resources into communities to foster hope and understanding, and, crucially, will they provide resources for safe, welcoming and suitable community-based accommodation for all people seeking asylum?”
“Will the Minister assure me that the White Paper places supporters at the heart of decision making to ensure that their voices are heard and that they can play a major role in shaping the future of football in this country?”
“Football without fans is nothing. The delay in the publication of the White Paper should worry every supporter. What we need now is protection for the future of the game: we need a regulator with teeth and a fit and proper owners test that is fit for purpose. As a Liverpool fan, I am worried about what we might face in future—I am sure that every other supporter of a club is the same. The delay in legislation harms the future of the game. Events this week, with the publication of the independent review of the events in Paris, which exonerated Liverpool supporters, show that governing bodies such as UEFA and Governments have a long way to go with regard to the treatment of supporters. We must never forget that they are the lifeblood of the game, which is why this is important—this is a crucial point in football history.”
“The Minister is very kind. After 13 years of Tory austerity wreaking devastation in my city, £75 million-worth of cuts are expected this year, putting vital services such as the benefits maximisation team under threat. Those are the very services he talks about—the ones that have kept people alive during this time. At the moment, one in three people in my city lives in food poverty. The ideological underfunding of councils such as Liverpool’s is becoming a national scandal. Does the Minister agree?”
“We should all expect to have that in a functioning, fair and democratic society. That is why the fight to end the injustice seen by the Cammell Laird 37 is so important for the people involved and the country at large. Justice should not be a pipe dream, but a reality. I close by asking the Minister this. Where is the Government’s apology and acknowledgement that there was no basis for the convictions? Will the Minister agree to a public inquiry with the power to compel disclosure? Anything else is an abdication of leadership and decency by this Government. The campaigners and the people who suffered deserve nothing less.”
“As someone who was at Hillsborough in 1989 and now chairs the all-party parliamentary group on public accountability, I have lived and seen the scale of cover-ups by the British state. It is a shameful history that we have—from the nuclear test veterans to the contaminated blood scandal, from the Birmingham Six to Hillsborough. There are many, many more I could talk about for hours. If we continually have a state and establishment that act with impunity and evade responsibility and accountability for their actions and the consequences of those actions, how do we ensure such injustices will never again be perpetrated? That is why a Hillsborough law would be so important in ensuring that justice is not an abstract concept for the working class in this country who have been wronged by the state.”
“He continues: “Unfortunately Dave passed away 10 years ago.” That shows the devastating impact of standing up for your community and fighting for a trade union. Truth and justice are still being denied almost 40 years later. In 2014 the European Parliament ruled that the British Government had no basis for the convictions and should apologise and remunerate the 37 pickets. The Government have done nothing to this day. Appallingly, no records that relate to the policing of the dispute, British Shipbuilders’ handling of industrial relations or the Government’s response have been published. That is despite the European Parliament Committee on Petitions calling on the UK Government almost a decade ago to release all relevant papers and information to allow justice for the Laird strikers.”
“They were blacklisted and they lost their redundancy and pension rights. For standing up for the future of their communities, they were punished by the state, with the effects lasting a lifetime. I want to read a testimony of Allen Small, who is a good friend. He says, “In 1984 I was a 19-year-old apprentice at Cammell Laird. Myself and one other apprentice Dave Griffiths refused to cross the picket line and we joined the strike. Dave and I were sacked for refusing to attend work. I struggled for many years to find work. I applied for many jobs and welding courses but was always unsuccessful. Eventually I retrained as an electrician and found work in shop fitting and on building sites in London”— away from the north west.”
“Cammell Laird was a national asset that the Government were preparing for privatisation by halving the workforce. In 1984, 1,000 more planned redundancies were announced and the strike and occupation took place in response. The targeting of trade union members at Cammell Laird was truly despicable and culminated in an injunction seeking to remove strikers occupying the rig, enforced by the police. Then there was the arrest and month’s imprisonment of 37 workers at Walton jail—a category A prison in which they all suffered greatly. The 37 trade unionists were tried and convicted in their absence. They were denied the opportunity to defend themselves in court and a fair opportunity to clear their names. Once released, the Cammell Laird 37 never worked at the shipyard again.”
“It is only thanks to the remarkable efforts of campaigners like those in the Chamber today, as well as the likes of Eileen Turnbull and all those involved with the Shrewsbury 24, that that fight for justice was eventually won last year. But those from Cammell Laird and Orgreave are still denied that justice today. The industrial action at Cammell Laird happened against a backdrop of rapid de-industrialisation by the Thatcher Government. There was a decimation of jobs across Merseyside, where between 1978 and 1981 34,000 manufacturing jobs were lost. I grew up in Liverpool at that time, and it was an absolutely devastating period that we still have not fully recovered from. Remember that the Thatcher Government were contemplating the managed decline of my great city at the same time.”
“Those 37 workers and their families have now suffered the further injustice of almost 40 years in which truth and justice has been denied to them by the state. Sadly, many have passed away in that time. The workers were deliberately targeted to try to break the industrial action they were partaking in to save the shipyard and hundreds of jobs. As part of the state’s attempt to demoralise the workers taking strike action across the country at the same time, we saw the same modus operandi at Shrewsbury and Orgreave, with the state using brutal tactics to break industrial disputes. It then implemented a cover-up to deny the victims the justice they deserve.”
“It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir Christopher, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow West (Gareth Thomas) for securing this important debate. I declare that I am a proud member of the GMB trade union. I will start by paying tribute to the 37 Cammell Laird workers and their families—a number of them are here in Parliament today—and all the campaigners who have been fighting for justice for so long. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Birkenhead (Mick Whitley), who I know wanted to be here today, for his tireless campaigning over decades. I fully back the campaign to secure truth and justice for the 37 Cammell Laird workers who were imprisoned in Walton jail in 1984.”
“(Urgent Question) : To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if she will make a statement on the national police response to the Hillsborough families report.”
“Yesterday, we finally had the response to the report from the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council. This was the first apology from the police force for its actions since the disaster 33 years ago. For so many, including myself, it is far too little and far too late. Yesterday’s recommendations from the police did not go anywhere near far enough to change the culture that we came up against in our quest for justice. I ask the Minister whether this Government will do the right thing for future generations in our nation and implement a Hillsborough law containing Bishop Jones’s recommendations with immediate effect. The families and survivors of so many disasters and consequent state cover-ups deserve nothing less, and these injustices must never again be allowed.”
“In 2017, Bishop Jones delivered the report “The patronising disposition of unaccountable power: A report to ensure the pain and suffering of the Hillsborough families is not repeated.” Shamefully, we have not yet had a Government response to his recommendations in the report commissioned by the then Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May). Yesterday, Bishop Jones said that the delay was intolerable. His recommendations are, in essence, the Hillsborough law, which so many in this place and outside have since campaigned for. We must always remember that these recommendations are to ensure that no other community goes through the suffering that we have endured since 1989. They will hopefully futureproof the ability to gain justice.”
“Since that awful day on 15 April 1989, 97 people have died directly from the actions of South Yorkshire police and other agencies, including the emergency services, the Football Association and Sheffield Wednesday Football Club, with families destroyed and survivors traumatised—so traumatised that many have since taken their own lives. The lies and smears from the cover-up by the establishment, which acted with impunity and arrogance because it could, meant that justice was never delivered for all those who have died and suffered since.”
“I am deeply opposed to the Bill, which further curtails the right to strike and other trade union activities. I fully support the rights of workers to take industrial action. I voted against this dreadful Bill on Second Reading, and I will continue to oppose it in this place and out on the streets with the public, who also oppose it. We can and must do better than this dreadful, divisive and potentially unlawful Bill.”
“The Prime Minister speaks about restoring integrity, yet here he is presiding over the empowerment of speculators and lifting the bankers’ bonus cap as our key workers lose their right to strike. It is beyond shameful. I have sponsored 25 amendments aimed at protecting the right of workers to take industrial action, and at neutralising this appalling Bill, which attacks our fundamental right to strike. I support Labour’s amendments to safeguard protections against unfair dismissal, and further amendments that would require the Government to submit the legislation to greater parliamentary scrutiny, including by forcing the publication of assessments of how the Bill would impact on individual workers, equalities, employers and unions.”
“Well, I cannot help but find that pledge laughable as I stand here speaking out against this Government’s Bill, which will see key workers lose their protection from unfair dismissal and trade unions sued for upholding workers’ rights. It is clear that the Government are trying to fast-track the legislation through Parliament without proper scrutiny. The Bill lacks detail, and I note that the TUC has submitted a freedom of information request to ascertain why it has been published without an impact assessment. It is a further insult to our key public sector workers that this bonfire of workers’ rights is unfolding just as the Government are laying the groundwork for another bonfire—one of financial regulations, through the Financial Services and Markets Bill.”
“The old chestnut that work pays is becoming a bigger fallacy than some hon. Members’ tax returns. Nurses, firefighters, teachers and other public sector workers are all targeted in this Bill, prohibited from striking and risking dismissal if they resist. Let us be clear: these public sector workers are being forced into industrial action in the first place by a Government who have overseen 12 years of real-terms pay cuts, the erosion of job security and pensions and the destruction of our public services. I note that the Prime Minister said today, after finally sacking his party chairman, that he “will take whatever steps are necessary to restore the integrity back into politics”.”
“It is always a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey). I rise to speak in favour of amendments 80, 84, 97, 20, 83, 93, 85, 95, 92, new clause 1 and all amendments tabled by the Opposition Front Bench. I am absolutely delighted to declare that I am a member of Unite and the GMB. I start by congratulating members of the Fire Brigades Union on their resounding strike ballot today, which really was democracy in action, and expressing solidarity with all the workers in dispute this week. This is a pernicious Bill designed to target the very same workers who, as a nation, we clapped from our doorsteps not so long ago in gratitude for their heroics during the pandemic—the same key workers who, let us not forget, are being forced to use food banks in vast numbers because their work does not pay.”
“Instead of bringing it to Parliament, Ministers should have been spending time negotiating meaningfully with the trade unions about pay and conditions. They could also have used that time to write the long-promised employment Bill. The Bill must be voted down. The draconian drift is becoming a raging current. Any parliamentarian who believes in the democratic rights of our citizens must see that clearly and kick this wretched piece of legislation out of this place.”
“We have a multi-millionaire Prime Minister who will never know what it is like to feel hungry—he will never fear the creep of poverty at the door of his home—telling public sector workers facing this dire situation that they will be sacked if they withdraw their labour when they are simply saying, “Enough is enough.” It is obscene. We have a morally bankrupt Government with financial scandal after financial scandal, and second job after second job, bringing in draconian legislation to outlaw industrial action for the very people we clapped during covid for everything they had done for us as a nation. The Bill is purposefully lacking in detail. It is a practically unworkable and potentially unlawful attempt to undermine the right to strike.”