Iain Duncan Smith has been branded a “ratbag” by a furious protester who disrupted the UK Government minister as he defended controversial welfare reforms.
The Work and Pensions Secretary was one of the main speakers at a conference examining changes to the benefits system in Edinburgh on Wednesday.
As he started to speak one man shouted at the Tory that the Westminster coalition is creating a new poll tax with its reforms.
Later two partially sighted people were escorted out of the conference venue after they too heckled Mr Duncan Smith.
As he began his address, one protester demanded:
“Why are you here in Scotland? We have a different philosophy, we’ve not elected you and your Tory cohorts.”
Referring to the fact there are two giant pandas in Edinburgh Zoo while Scotland has just one Conservative MP, the man said:
“We don’t want you, we don’t need you. We’ve got more pandas than you. You’ve only got one MP.
“We want a different Scotland, one that cares for people who are in distress and poverty. You are going to make millions of people homeless, people that desperately need help. You’re making the rich richer and the poor poorer.”
He told Mr Duncan Smith:
“You are creating your new poll tax, that’s what you’re going to do. We’re going to see the end of you, back to England where you belong, you ratbag.”
The Work and Pensions Secretary insisted that the welfare system has a key role in “providing effective support for the most vulnerable and helping those who have fallen on hard times to get back on their feet”.
Mr Duncan Smith said: “This Government, I believe, is on the side of a welfare that does just that.”
As he spoke he was then heckled by two partially sighted protesters: a man with a guide dog and a woman carrying a white stick.
The pair, who gave their names as Jonathan Smith and Charlie Sabenfox, were both escorted from the city centre hotel where the event, organised by Capita Conferences, was taking place.
As they shouted at him, Mr Duncan Smith told them:
“If you listen to what I am saying, you will understand the reality is that this country is not cutting welfare, it is managing the growth at a lower level.”
Was it at a lower level when he robbed the taxpayer by claiming money for his wife as a secretary when she did no work .
they are the real benefit fraudsters!
well done to the proud people of scotland, hold your heads high and kick that idiot all the way to the border, preferably iceland as we dont want him in the uk either.
C’mon Ken, Iceland had the guts to do what no other European country did. It put two fingers up to austerity measures and told the bankers where to go. Wouldn’t it have been great if the UK had done the same? We wouldn’t be protesting at the “bedroom tax or welfare reform if the UK had taken that line.
Iceland are doing fine now because they refused to bail out the bankers so why would you want to blight them with the presence of IDS? They should be congratulated not maligned.
What he probably means by the ‘lower level’ is the lowering of the welfare bill, or to give it it’s proper name, ‘social security’. Nice how they don’t like admitting that this is what they’re cutting back on – the things most poorer folk have paid into at some point in their lives so the state will look after them when they’re desperate.
Interesting that Capita is paying for his conferences and has been donating towards junkets and the Tory party’s think tanks, then they suddenly get included in the reform contracts. Interesting, not necessarily surprising.
Not just Scotland desperate to get away from the Tories either, take us with you: http://capitalism-creates-poverty.blogspot.co.uk/2012/01/when-scots-leave-uk-north-should-join.html
Doff my cap to the people who got in though – brave of you, I only wish it’d be shown by mainstream media, I’ve emailed the Beeb but they’ve not exactly done much previously have they?
If you listen to what I am saying, you will understandthe reality is that this country is not cutting welfare, its managing the growth at a lower level.”
yes he is at expense of the of the disabled / terminally ill! thats their answer regarding the lower level and by saying this he has shown the Governments true colours regarding open contempt that Cameron has for the disabled people / voters he blames us for him having a disabled son and there venting anger on all those who are on whatever benefits we are in receipt off? hence this is why he is trying to change the human right laws so as we cannot fight them? or damage them!
Here is answer [part] of a letter I received from the head of correspondence for the DWP! is as follows:
during 2011 & 2012 Minsters brought in reforms to housing benefit payments in the private rented sector.There were a great number of negative predictions before the introduction of the local housing allowance reforms. It was claimed that 42% of landlords would scale back rentals to housing benefits claimants. It was claimed that 134.000 people would have to move home or become homeless “However these fears have not come to pass” As I wrote to the Queen she passed on to Cameron & passed on the DWP hence I had a two & a half page letter from his brainwashed moron?
It is these coalition politicians that are operating at a lower level in my opinion, not welfare. If IDS thinks it is bad now, wait until the bedroom tax and council tax benefit cuts really start to bite. I suspect it won’t be safe for him to speak in public anymore.
Could I just point out that he doesn’t belong in England either!!
At least the Scots have a chance to escape 🙁
Last night i dream’t i was better than an ordinary human being. I dream’t i was a peer in the House of Lords.
I dream’t i could inflict pain, desperation, poverty and death on the weakest in society.
I dream’t of a life with no boundaries, where money was at my fingertips, each and every bill was paid and i owed no-one…..
I dreamt i was enjoying the finest taxpayer subsidised food whilst wearing the most expensive fineries of my office……
I dream’t of my £300 expenses, my chaffeur driven limousine and my Edwardian mansion, nestling near the woods and stream and acres of open landscape…..
I dream’t of a life so opulent with friends in high places……
Then i woke up to stark reality, shivering on the floor, clothes in tatters, clutching a food voucher…