Diane Abbott ‘stuck in Abuja’ on day of bedroom tax vote
Hackney MP Diane Abbott. Photograph: Aoife Moriarty
Hackney and Stoke Newington MP Diane Abbott missed a vote on the government’s controversial benefit reforms as she was ‘stuck in Abuja’, her spokesperson has said.
The MP for Hackney and Stoke Newington has been an outspoken opponent of the so-called ‘bedroom tax’, which reduces social housing tenants’ benefit entitlements based on the number of occupants in their household.
Those with one empty bedroom face a 14 per cent reduction in housing benefit, while two or more spare bedrooms leads to a cut of 25 per cent.
It is estimated as many as 3,664 households have been affected by the benefit reforms in Hackney, but on the day of a crucial vote calling for the reforms to be ditched, Ms Abbott was abroad in Nigeria – to the puzzlement of many of her supporters who had wanted her to participate on their behalf.
Ms Abbott had branded the welfare reforms “brutal and deeply divisive, and yet another example of the punitive nature of the Coalition Government’s policies – hitting the poorest hardest”.
Her spokesperson told the Hackney Citizen: “Diane Abbott strongly supports scrapping the bedroom tax. Unfortunately on the day of the vote she was stuck in Abuja, Nigeria.”
Last November Ms Abbott cancelled a speech at a local Keep Our NHS public meeting at short notice to fly to Venezuela to observe the election victory of Hugo Chavez.
Related: