Palestine Action Proscription Vote

Mine was a vote AGAINST the Government and the Order, and a PROTEST VOTE against the procedure which the Government adopted to get their way. The context was: 

1. We clearly weren’t going to defeat the government;
   2. The government cynically included two despicable organisations, which should have been proscribed long ago, alongside Palestine Action, for which I felt there was no justification to include;
   3. My Liberal Democrat leader and whips chose to abstain, which I told them I could not do and would vote against. I was keen to encourage as many of my Liberal Democrat colleagues to support my position, and to join me in the lobby against the government. 

I have previously chosen to vote in both lobbies on very rare occasions, and always to ensure that I record a protest at THE WAY a matter is being handled, as well as against the primary subject itself. There is no other formal method of doing this. Having said I’d vote against, I was aware that some of my Liberal Democrat colleagues found the situation very upsetting and unacceptable, and like me wanted to vote against, but didn’t want to defy the whips. So, I managed to persuade some of them to adopt the RECORDED PROTEST VOTE method, which seemed to work, and to enable a few more Liberal Democrat MPs to join me in the opposition lobby. To assure them, I really had to do the same. 

My protest against this ill-advised and extremely worrying move by the Government will not stop here. The campaign will go on. 

Parliamentary tools and procedures are often impenetrable and difficult to explain, but I hope this helps to go some way towards clarifying the situation, but please contact me again if it would help.