How many Labour MP’s voted against austerity cuts?

A couple of days ago the SNP detailed the 28 Labour MP’s in Scotland that voted for George Osborne’s budget and the billions of pounds in cuts he intends to unleash across the UK. There’s some predictable names in there such as Douglas Alexander, Margaret Curran and Anas Sawar, but one would be right in querying why on earth these people that represent some of the poorest, most deprived parts of not just Scotland, but the UK, can justify voting for cuts that will directly affect their constituents?

This has brought condemnation not only from parties on the left (sorry Labour, you’re no longer a party of the left) such as the SNP, Green’s and Plaid Cymru but it’s also stirred some voices within the Labour Party itself. Only five Labour MP’s had the courage to vote against the Labour whip and they were Diane Abbott, Katy Clark, Dennis Skinner, Austin Mitchell and Roger Godsiff. The rest of Labour either voted for it, or as Labour have done far, far too often against Coalition policy, they’ve chickened out and abstained so often in the past as this Wings Over Scotland article details.

So there you go. Only five Labour MP’s stood alongside the MP’s of 13 different parties in opposing austerity, so when Labour say they oppose coalition/Tory policy, they really don’t. The argument between Osborne and Balls in regards austerity isn’t whether we need it at all, but the pace parties will cut. It’s like saying to a person with an illness that that they have a choice of dying in a year of in four years instead of trying to work out if there’s a cure, or their illness can be helped in another way apart from the treatment that doesn’t work, which is exactly what austerity is.

As this election campaign builds up speed there’s going to be a lot of lies and spin flying around but never forget every single Labour MP bar five either voted for, or abstained in regards to Tory and Lib Dem austerity plans. For that, they can never be forgiven.