HfHR UK and the Palestine Solidarity Campaign

By Rajiv Sinha, HfHR’s UK Representative

Today was the day scheduled for the House of Commons to vote on the second Gaza ceasefire motion, put forward by the Scottish National Party (SNP) – one of the few parties in the United Kingdom to prove its conscience (alongside Plaid Cymru, the Green Party of England and Wales, Sinn Fein, and the Social Democratic and Labour Party).

As I write this, I just got back home from waiting for three and a half hours at the Palace of Westminster.  I’m not complaining – this was part of the statement protesters were making, organised by Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC), and many people waited for twice as long.

As a subscribed member of PSC I receive their newsletters, statements, and updates.  On Thursday, 15th February I read in an email of theirs about their plan to have as many people as possible directly lobby their Member of Parliament (MP) in the Palace of Westminster just six days later.

I was excited to learn about a direct action campaign to address the ongoing, undeniable horrors in Gaza, perpetrated by an apartheid state, supported by many Western states.  I was also intrigued to have been introduced to “Green Carding”.  This is a direct form of lobbying that every British citizen is entitled to do, but that is, perhaps unsurprisingly, not widely advertised.  Every Brit has the right to enter the Houses of Parliament and speak directly to their MP.

The procedure is as follows: you line up at the Visitor Entrance by Cromwell Green, outside the statue of Richard Coeur de Lion, go through airport-style security, and tell an official inside who your MP is.  That official then reaches out to the MP.  If the MP is in, they are meant to come and meet you; if they’re not, you leave a message and your contact details for them to reach out.  (This is where “lobbying” comes from: Westminster representatives traditionally hang out in the “lobbies” or hallways of parliament to meet members of the public.)

Normally you wouldn’t wait long in line, but today’s ‘mass emergency lobby’ saw the use of questionable methods by authorities (I don’t know enough to say exactly who was responsible).  PSC was great at keeping its followers closely updated, both with in-person presence and online via X/Twitter.  Here is one series of tweets from them that alerted me and fellow would-be lobbyists:

Many thanks to John McDonnell MP for being on the side of the people and on the right side of history.

My elation at having been part of such a large campaign that might have made a difference by affecting the behaviour of MPs has now largely dissipated as I am drip fed the news that the vote in the House of Commons has collapsed.

I never expected this to happen…  I don’t think anyone did.  What I expected was that our parliamentarians would repeat the disastrous, fatal decision of the first vote.  Instead, I am hearing that the government has withdrawn its amendment, then that the Conservatives and the SNP have walked out of the voting hall in protest at the Speaker’s behaviour, meaning that there can be no vote, then that the vote may be held in private instead, then that the ceasefire vote has been replaced all together by a protest vote about procedure, then that Labour’s amendment to the motion has passed because its opposition was absent.

I’ll let the media fill us in on the details once this chaos ends.  Subordinated to our politicking, Palestinian lives are put on hold yet again.