Welfare not warfare: Labour must scrap disgraceful nuclear weapons
Speaking on the UN International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, Scottish Green co-leader Patrick Harvie has urged the Labour government to scrap the Trident nuclear weapons system and use its funding to reinstate the winter fuel payment, scrap the two-child benefit cap and build a fairer, greener future.
Since entering office, the Labour Chancellor Rachel Reeves has launched a new wave of austerity, cutting the winter fuel payment for pensioners and upholding the cruel two-child benefit cap and rape clause which were introduced by the Tories. However, the Scottish Greens are calling for the UK government to use the money it is pouring into nuclear weapons to reverse these brutal austerity measures.
Speaking on International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, Scottish Greens Co-Leader Patrick Harvie said: “Nuclear weapons are an obscene moral evil that should have no place in 21st-century society. Yet, there are still vast numbers of warheads scattered across the planet, and hundreds of them are based here in Scotland on the Clyde.
“The Labour government claim that they cannot afford to give pensioners the winter fuel allowance or scrap the two-child benefit cap, yet they are yet again marching lockstep with the Tories in committing to giving the nuclear weapons programme a bottomless pit of money.
“The eye-watering sums that are being poured into nuclear weapons would be far better spent lifting children and families out of poverty and tackling the climate crisis, which is the greatest security threat we face.
“But even if Trident had no cost implications, keeping it would still be totally immoral. There can never be any justification for weapons which are only capable of indiscriminate mass killing, or the brutal legacy such as those left by the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 80 years ago.
“If we want to take a stand for global peace, we must lead by example. I look forward to the day when an independent Scotland can rid nuclear weapons from our waters and fully commit to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.”