30 June 2017

Tory MPs yesterday voted down a Labour motion to “end austerity … and make society more equal”.

Jeremy Corbyn brought an amendment to the Queen’s Speech that called on the government to take forth the proposals Labour made in its own 2017 General Election manifesto, including several key policies to strengthen workers’ rights such as a raise in the minimum wage to a real living wage of at £10 per hour by 2020, an end to the public sector pay cap, and a guaranteed right to remain for EU nationals living in the UK.

Introducing the motion, Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said: “As of this year, Mr Speaker, I have been in the House for 20 years, just as you have. Never in all that time have we seen such a threadbare scrap of a document as this Queen’s Speech.”

“The Queen’s Speech says: ‘My Ministers will strengthen the economy so that it supports the creation of jobs’. The reality is that we are witnessing, to quote the Governor of the Bank of England, the weakest UK business investment in half a century, and the growth of insecure, low-paid, low-skilled jobs, with nearly one million people now on zero-hours contracts,” he added.

The Tories and DUP voted the motion down by 323 to 297.