Labour’s Dennis Skinner wins battle of the benches with SNP MPs – Mirror Online

Last Updated: May 18, 2015By

How much more pathetic can the SNP be?

It seems that party’s MPs arrived early for the first day of the new Parliament, and took it in turns to hold onto Dennis Skinner’s habitual spot on the front corner of the Commons benches.

Oh, what a rib-tickling jape! Stealing a seat from an 83-year-old man. What a ridiculous gang of thugs.

If any Scottish people are reading this, who actually voted for those goons, This Writer hopes you are ashamed of them. You should tell them to grow up.

Anyway, it turns out that the Bolsover Beast was still capable of outwitting these fools.

He grabbed his seat back after MPs stood for a routine sweep of the chamber by sniffer dogs.

He said: “I only had half a cheek on, but I was there before them and I will be there when they are gone.”

Clearly, Dennis sees the SNP as a flash-in-the-pan. Let’s hope he helps flush them away.

Source: Labour’s Dennis Skinner wins battle of the benches with SNP MPs – Mirror Online

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24 Comments

  1. NMac May 19, 2015 at 7:00 am - Reply

    Even more childish than most of our parliamentarians.

  2. John Gaines May 19, 2015 at 9:30 am - Reply

    This is symptomatic of the current disaster that calls itself the Labour Party, instead of embracing the SNP, IT IS AFTER ALL THEIR COUNTRY ALSO, y’all start sputtering slights at those who actually saved Socialism in Scotland,

    Why, what and who cares…what the self-styled ‘Labour Party’ is now, what is as certain as the Nose on your face, is that you are not any longer the Labour Party, in the terms of supporting working class people; even after having your useless asses wiped by a Tory dictatorship all that the ‘New Leader’ hopefuls can spout about is the need to cuddle up to the Criminal Corporations now drawing copious quantities of ‘Welfare’ because they have gambled away all their investors Capital.

    Whatever you may think you are, you are not Labour…and bye the bye, Unions were founder members of the Labour Party, what is wrong with their need to ensure that A NEW LEADER, would, at least give a fig for the ‘Working Man.

    Dennis needs to retire,all his amusing rhetoric has achieved nothing for those he was elected to care for.

    • Mike Sivier May 19, 2015 at 11:09 am - Reply

      What are you on about?
      This is about a gang of buffoons who thought it would be funny to torment a respected man in his place of work, and your comment is a ridiculous diatribe about what you think the Labour Party has become.
      Have a sense of perspective.

  3. John Duffy May 19, 2015 at 11:57 am - Reply

    In Scotland its called tough. Maybe he should be next door with all the other 800 buffoons. Westminster is a joke. Never moved on in 300 years.

    • Mike Sivier May 19, 2015 at 12:27 pm - Reply

      It’s tough everywhere else too; you’ll be aware that Dennis made fools of them all.

      • John May 20, 2015 at 10:21 pm - Reply

        Dennis made a fool of him self! 83 yrs old and crying for a seat. If that’s all he wants is to be seen on the front bench well it says a lot about the fool.

        • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 10:49 pm - Reply

          Just as your comment says a great deal about you.

    • Chunkie May 21, 2015 at 12:36 pm - Reply

      Dennis Skinner is one of the most respected MP’s in Parliament and is known for his forthright views and honesty by ALL parties, except it would seem the SNP who have much to learn. Perhaps if they did their homework and didn’t walk in like a bunch of navvies into a pub they might realise that if they don’t obey the rules and customs they will find themselves unable to represent their constituents!

  4. lambtonwyrm May 19, 2015 at 10:20 pm - Reply

    So SNP arrive in Westminster and start throwing their weight around by playing musical chairs. They would do well to emulate Desnis Skinner, an MP who has earned the respect of others.
    If they are half as good as he is then they will have achieved something.

  5. peter bannan May 20, 2015 at 10:07 am - Reply

    Did this nonsense really take place? Sounds like total rubbish to me.

    • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 11:28 am - Reply

      Yes, it really did.

  6. Joan Edington May 20, 2015 at 11:11 am - Reply

    Quoting a different view to that which has been in all the MSM on this supposedly important matter.

    “SKINNER vs SNP: AN APPROXIMATION OF TRUTH

    Cramped conditions in busy Commons leads to childish dispute over seating space. End of story.

    THE TRUTH
    Normally, MPs can reserve seats by placing what is known as a “prayer card” in a slot in the bench – but this was the one day in five years when, by a quirk, that rule did not apply. The only way to bag a seat was to sit on it. Themz the rules, and the SNP followed them. Cheekily.

    Early in the morning, therefore, a squad of SNP MPs rounded up by their chief whip, Pete Wishart, were under orders to keep their posteriors fixed on the opposition front bench.

    But Dennis Skinner is never easily put off. Spotting that a tiny fragment of the very end of the bench was not filled, he planted himself there, defying the SNP to push him off. Soon politeness prevailed and they moved up – but then came another problem: the Father of the House, Sir Gerald Kaufman, had finished presiding over the ceremonial re-election of the Speaker and, needing somewhere to sit, hobbled towards the same crowded corner, with over 600 MPs and dozens of visitors looking on.

    Skinner then turned to the MP next to him, the gigantic but gentle MP for Dundee West, Chris Law, and said; “Are you going to have a fight with two 83 year old men?”

    “You’re not 83!” said Law.

    “I bloody am!” said Skinner – who, by the way, had understated Kaufman’s age by a year.

    The SNP contingent then moved to give the two old men space, and the two old men of a combined age of 167 were able to sit comfortably.

    End of story.

    The mainstream pro-Union media should be ashamed of their misdirection and dishonesty when reporting this non-story. As lifelong fans of Mr. Skinner, we are a little disappointed in how seriously he took all this, and proud that the SNP made way for him, and behaved with courtesy and with respect for the rules, both official and unofficial.”

    And to show how seriously the Labour MPs took it, they shoved the SNP off the LibDem seats in retaliation.

    • Mike Sivier May 21, 2015 at 9:43 pm - Reply

      Your version of the story says that a squad of newly-elected SNP MPs, organised by their chief whip, deliberately set out to deprive another MP of decades-greater standing of the place that had been his, habitually, for those decades – for no particular reason other than to cause trouble.

      They were only dissuaded from this ridiculous nonsense when it became clear that they might have to engage in physical violence with not one but two people, both by far their superior in age, stature and manners. Even then, the MP for Dundee West tried to put forward a falsehood about Dennis’s age.

      The more people try to reinterpret this story, the more pathetic the SNP’s behaviour becomes.

  7. Joan Edington May 20, 2015 at 11:13 am - Reply

    Have you banned me now Mike?

    • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 11:27 am - Reply

      No. Why would I?

      • Joan Edington May 20, 2015 at 1:12 pm - Reply

        I posted a comment, it looked same as usual, but didn’t appear in the blog. By the time I saw my query appear it was too late to take it back.

        The nonsense, of course, was taken up by Labour MPs who stopped the SNP using the benches that had been the LibDems when they were the 3rd party. The whole thing was blown out of all proportion by the media, as usual, since the SNP did move along perfectly politely to make room for Skinner and Kaufman.

        • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 1:16 pm - Reply

          Can you point us to any evidence of that? News reports, perhaps?

  8. Joan Edington May 20, 2015 at 5:42 pm - Reply

    Link to BBC report.
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-32802374
    Also tweets by Paul Monaghan MP
    “In the Chamber today Labour decided they would not allow #SNP56 to use seats allocated to 3rd largest party. We sat in their seats instead!”

    • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 5:49 pm - Reply

      You see the quote from Erskine May? Front benches are for the main Opposition party – Labour in this case.
      You see also the last two paragraphs? “SNP MPs want to occupy the front two rows of the opposition benches, as the Liberal Democrats did in opposition when they were the third largest party.

      “The Lib Dems vacated those benches when they joined the government benches opposite in coalition with the Conservative in 2010.”

      Dennis Skinner has been occupying the same seat for 40 years – as you can read in the Mirror’s report – so this is clearly inaccurate and Erskine May is correct in terms of custom, precedent and practice.

      This looks like an instance in which the SNP is making things up to suit itself.

      • Joan Edington May 20, 2015 at 6:18 pm - Reply

        I think Erskine May’s description of the front benches being for the main opposition really refers to the benches beside the table, up to the first gap. The front benches further down were traditionally for the 3rd party, until the LibDems crossed over. Dennis Skinner has been sitting at the end next to the opposition benches for a long time. Even if it went against tradition, people respect him. For a good diagram of the traditional layout see:
        http://thoughtundermined.com/2012/01/02/inside-the-british-house-of-commons/

        • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 6:57 pm - Reply

          Clearly some SNP MPs didn’t respect him.
          Hopefully they’ll learn their manners in due course.

  9. eddiem May 20, 2015 at 7:30 pm - Reply

    There are no allocated seats …Dennis has done more than his fair share of winding people up in the past ……. first come first served Dennis ……..as we say in Scotland …tough ! ! !

    • Mike Sivier May 20, 2015 at 9:43 pm - Reply

      No – as Dennis says, down in London, “I was there before them and I will be there when they are gone.”

      • John May 20, 2015 at 10:25 pm - Reply

        There is no moving SNP now!!! Look out English We’re moving in!!!!

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