Scottish MPs prevented their colleagues watching England's World Cup match by forcing obscure votes
Get politics updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe See our privacy notice Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again later Invalid Email
English MPs were delayed from watching tonight’s England World Cup match after SNP MPs forced votes on obscure Parliamentary business.
Every year the Commons considers estimates of public spending by government departments.
The motions are usually waved through the Commons without formal ‘divisions’ where MPs have to queue up and vote in the lobbies.
But when today’s motion came up at the end of today’s session in the house - bang on 7pm, when the match kicked off, a group of SNP members shouted “no”, forcing a formal vote.
The motion passed by 312 to 32.
They went on to call a vote on a second motion, which passed by 307 to 33.
In total the party called five formal votes, each taking 10-15 minutes each, and taking up the entire of the first half.
As MPs filed out for the second vote Tory MP Bernard Jenkin raised a point of order to ask: “Do you suppose that the Scottish National Party would be calling so many divisions this evening if it was Scotland playing an important football match this evening?”
But all Deputy Speaker Eleanor Laing (who is from Edinburgh) could do is express her “fervent hope that one day Scotland will be playing an important football match.”
A senior SNP source told the National earlier: “All I can say is that there are a couple of voteable motions up for consideration at about 7pm in which we may have an interest."