#plaid cymru

Two big stories in UK political news today, both in the form of Queen’s Speech Amendments. Last week, we gave you a quick overview of the 24 bills Theresa May’s Tories included in their Queen’s Speech, 8 of which focused on Brexit.

Today, two big amendments were put to a vote in the House of Commons.

First was a proposal led by Labour’s Stella Creasy to allow women from Northern Ireland to get free abortions in England. Currently, abortions in Northern Ireland are banned unless in extreme circumstances of poor health, and the women who travel to England for the procedures have to pay around £900. It passed the house and will now come into law.

The amendment - which was backed by more than 50 MPs from across the major parties - means Northern Irish women will now have their abortions in England covered by the NHS. Fairly reasonable, when you consider most of these women pay the taxes that fund the service. It is estimated the amendment will cost approximately £1 million per year.

Second was a Brexit-based amendment led by Labour’s Chuka Umunna. This amendment suggested the UK stay in the single market, which guarantees free movement of goods, services, money and labour within the EU. Jeremy Corbyn called on all Labour MP’s to abstain from the vote and threatened they would be sacked from any ministerial roles if they rebelled. So far we are aware of 3 Labour frontbenchers who have been sacked from their roles for not abstaining.

While parties such as Plaid Cymru and the Liberal Democrats showed unanimous support for the amendment, it was easily defeated due to Labour abstentions. 

Then all that remained was the vote on the final Queen’s Speech, the last piece of the puzzle to make Theresa May the undisputed Prime Minster of the United Kingdom. With the support of the DUP’s 10 MPs, the Queen’s Speech passed.

tl;dr Good news for women, bad news for business, great news for Theresa May