LABOUR'S deputy leader was branded "Runaway Rayner" after she abandoned a campaign visit in Scotland due to pro-Palestine protesters.
Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner had been due to arrive at Scottish Labour’s Hamilton hub, from which its campaign in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse Holyrood by-election is being co-ordinated, at around 1.15pm on Thursday.
However, a demonstration to greet her was organised by members of the Scottish Socialist Party and the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign, who chanted slogans including “Rayner, Rayner, you can’t hide, you’re supporting genocide” and “Don’t vote for genocide”.
Speeches focused on the UK Government’s decisions to continue licensing the export of military equipment to Israel and to continue sending RAF spy flights over Gaza despite an ongoing “genocide” in the region.
Amid some tussles and confrontations, Labour activists formed a wall between the campaign office and the demonstration, with the aim of providing a path for Rayner to enter the building.
However, around 30 minutes after she had been due to arrive, they were all called inside and word spread that the Deputy Prime Minister would not be appearing.
Protesters then began chants of “Rayner’s done a runner”, “Runaway Rayner”, and “Angela’s a coward”.
Media were given a new location at which to meet the Deputy Prime Minister – a residential street in a small village a few miles away – and headed there.
“You didn't see me doing a runner. There was no running,” she said. “What we were doing is campaigning, as we always expected to do around here.
“I'm out on the streets as it is now, and I'll be knocking on doors.”
Speaking later to The National, the Deputy Prime Minister was asked about the UK Government’s decision to send a trade envoy to Israel just days after ending talks on a trade deal with the country and branding its government “extremists”.
She said: “Well, the communication’s always open. We do have communications and we have regular meetings, but we’re very clear, and the Prime Minister has been very clear, on the issue of Gaza, it is intolerable, the situation.
“We need to see a ceasefire, we need to see humanitarian aid getting through, and we need to see a long-term solution for Palestine and for Israel where they can be safe and secure.”
Elsewhere, she repeatedly refused to confirm whether the Labour Government would end the two-child benefit cap, which reports have said the Prime Minister is minded to do.
Pushed on whether she personally wanted to see the cap scrapped, Rayner said: “We want to end child poverty.
“Now as someone who grew up in poverty, my mum and dad, we had three kids, we had child benefit and we were on benefits. It didn’t help us, in terms of poverty.
“What we want to do is help people alleviate poverty, to have good jobs, to have a good secure home, and to be able to get on in life. That's what this government is wanting to deliver.”
Speaking to The National from the pro-Palestine protest, Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) organiser Richie Venton said the demonstration was to “accuse the Labour Government of not just being supporters of genocide but actively participating in it”.
Venton said that voters on the doorstep are telling the SSP they are “utterly disgusted by [Labour] on all fronts”.
Collette Bradley is standing for the SSP in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse Holyrood by-election, which is to be held on June 5. Davy Russell is standing for Labour, Katy Loudon for the SNP, and Ross Lambie for Reform UK.
Polls had suggested the vote would be a contest between SNP and Labour, but increasingly the feeling on the ground is that Reform UK may take second place – a result which would send shockwaves through Scottish politics.
