I would have to look into that in more detail to find the exact reason why we abstained on that vote. I personally, of course, would have voted against it.
We know that the SNP Government created that situation with VAT in the full knowledge of what they were doing. They attempted to turn it into a grievance with Westminster, and then tried to use it to force a wedge between the nations of our United Kingdom. The Scottish National party is committed to the break-up of the UK. Every action it takes, every speech its members make and every policy from Bute House is weaponised and sent into battle for the express purpose of weakening the bonds between our nations and breaking apart the most successful economic and political Union in the world. It puts ideological and constitutional obsessions over the good of the Scottish people, and it always will.
I personally am proud to be British. I am proud of what this country has done in the past, and sure of what this united, global Britain will do in the future. I hope beyond hope that in 2021 the Scottish people will get the Government they deserve: a transformative Conservative Administration in Holyrood, delivering real, fair devolution to the people of Scotland and working alongside a Conservative Government in Westminster governing and legislating for the whole UK—working together in the national interest and strengthening our Union. Only then, as the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Patrick Grady) likes to say, will we truly be in the early days of a better nation.
8.19 pm