 I apologise to the members who can get in there. The next item of business is debate on motion 5282 in the name of Nicola Sturgeon on child tax credit cuts. I would invite all members who wish to speak in this debate to press their request to speak buttons now and a call on the First Minister to speak to and move the motion. I begin by moving the motion in my name. Last Thursday, together with Kezia Dugdale, Willie Rennie, Patrick Harvie and many MSPs from across this chamber, I attended the demonstration against the rape clause, which took place outside this building. At that demonstration, Sandy Brindley of Rape Crisis Scotland said that the opposition to the rape clause is not about party politics, it is about basic human rights, and I agree very much with that. Of course, the rape clause has come about because of the two child cap introduced three weeks ago by the UK Government. That cap means that child tax credits and universal credit will only be paid for two children in each family. I will talk about the rape clause in due course, but it is worth noting that the policy intention of those changes is not an inadvertent consequence, but the intention behind them is to reduce the income of low-wage families with children. The Institute of Fiscal Studies has set out the stark reality of that. 600,000 households across the UK will be £2,500 a year worse off. Another 300,000 households, those with four or more children, will on average be £7,000 a year worse off. The health secretary received a letter today from the Department of Work and Pensions, and it says that the reform is to ensure that people and benefits have to make the same choices as those supporting themselves through work. That really misses the point, does it not, that around two thirds of those families that will be affected by the policy are working households? They are people who are already participating in the labour market but on low incomes. The UK Government therefore seems to be directly targeting people that it claims to want to help. It is also important to note that those changes are part of a much bigger picture. In total by 2022, approximately £1 billion a year will have been cut from social security spending in Scotland. Only one-fifth of that is the result of the changes that took effect this month. For the past seven years, the Westminster Government has systematically reduced vital social security safety nets. For example, by freezing the work allowance, cutting support for housing and cutting the income of people with disabilities. Let's just reflect on some of the consequences that those decisions have had. Sick and disabled people have seen their incomes reduced by around £30 a week due to cuts in employment and support allowance. Every week, right now, around 800 motability vehicles are being removed from disabled people across the UK as a result of changes to personal independence payments. A fact that makes Ruth Davidson's decision yesterday to pose for photographs sitting on a motability scooter all the more insulting to every disabled person who has lost that support. Young people aged 18 to 21 have also had their financial help with housing costs removed, and bereavement payments and widdled parents allowance have been cut. Of course, more than 70,000 households in Scotland, but for our action, would have been hit by the bedroom tax. More than 80 per cent of those households have at least one adult who is disabled. That is one reason why the UN has described the UK Government's welfare cuts as discriminatory and a systematic violation of disabled people's rights. How shocking is that? The United Nations is describing the attack on disabled people's benefits as a systematic violation of their rights. Inevitably, those cuts disproportionately affect families on low incomes. Those who most need support and assistance. There is overwhelming evidence that they also disproportionately affect women. As the women's budget group has noted, five to six of those cuts that the UK Government is making to social security and tax credits will come from women's incomes. It is worth repeating that. Five to six of the impact of those cuts are being borne by women. No Government surely, with a genuine concern for those who just about manage, and the women who so often have the responsibility of holding those households together, could ever have chosen to reduce the deficit in this way. The two-child cap on tax credits is, in some senses, unsurprising, though deeply regrettable, because it is the sort of policy that we have, yes. I am very grateful to the First Minister for taking the intervention. Is she surprised to learn that this is, in fact, the second time that the Conservatives have sought to introduce this policy after they were successfully blocked from doing so in the last Parliament? Does she agree with me that this is yet further evidence that the Conservatives have gone too far? No, I am not surprised to hear that, because I know that. While I oppose many of those benefit cuts, I think that this one—particularly the rape clause that flows from it—is definitely going too far in the wrong direction. It is the sort of policy that we have come to expect from this Government, but the implications of this policy, as the rape clause so vividly illustrates, are truly abhorrent. The very need to provide an exemption from the two-child cap for women who have been raped shows the callousness of those cuts in the first place. The rape clause is wrong in principle. The equality and human rights commission, the equality and human rights commission, said just at the end of last week that, because of this policy, there is a clear risk of the re-traumatisation of rape survivors. No woman, no woman anywhere, should have to prove that she has been raped in order to get tax credits for her child. I actually cannot believe that, in 2017, I am having to stand up in the Scottish Parliament and make that argument. This policy is not just immoral, although it definitely is. It is also unworkable in practice. The proposal for third-party verification puts an unacceptable burden on health workers and rape crisis centres, as well as on officials from the Department of Work and Pensions. Rape crisis Scotland, Scottish Women's Aid, NHS Scotland and many others quite rightly have refused to collude with this clause. That is one of the reasons why, although it has now passed into law, no one, no one in the UK Government is able to explain how it will work in practice. So many basic questions are still completely unanswered. What burden of proof is required? How will the claim be verified and recorded? How can this process possibly take place without the women fearing that it will be hugely stigmatising for her and her child? I would ask Ruth Davidson today not to dodge those detailed questions, but to do what no one has done thus far and to answer those questions. As she does so, I would ask her to imagine the trauma for any mother, already a victim of rape, who has to go through such a process. Imagine having to report the most personal and painful information imaginable, then having to go through a process of verification and having that information recorded for years as a condition of one of your financial lifelines. Imagine all that, because the moment you do, the moment anyone considers all that must surely be the moment that the sheer inhumanity of this policy becomes clear. Of course, the Tories' argument today is going to be that we should just ignore the inhumanity of this, that we should just put up with whatever callous cuts the UK Government wants to introduce. According to the Tories, instead of arguing for the repeal of policies such as the rape clause on grounds of principle and common humanity, the Scottish Government should just apply some sticking plaster. I want to address that ridiculous argument head on today. First, let us be clear about this. The Scottish Government cannot abolish the two-child cap or the rape clause. We do not have the legal power to do so. Given the complexity of tax credits and universal credit, trying to mitigate the impact of those cuts would be significantly more complex than simply compensating people for the bedroom tax. That is not the only issue. The real issue here is the financial impact of mitigation on other services. This is a key point. When the UK Government makes those cuts, it does not pass Scotland's share of the savings on to the Scottish Government. If it did, we could make our own choices, whether to reverse the cut or follow the UK Government in spending the money elsewhere. However, the UK Government keeps the money from those savings, so any decision by this Government to mitigate one of those cuts involves taking money that is already allocated to schools, to hospitals and to other services. Of course, notwithstanding that, we have mitigated where we can. We should not have to, but we have. Since 2013, this Government has spent £350 million mitigating the bedroom tax, and where we control benefits, we make our own choices. We will not, for example, apply the two-child cap in our council tax reduction scheme. However, we simply cannot accept a situation where the Tories can implement whatever heartless cut they want to and the only answer is for the Scottish Government to take money from elsewhere to plug the gap. Where does that end? If we accept that argument, there would be nothing to stop the Tories deciding to no longer pay any benefits for people in Scotland, pocket the savings and look to the Scottish Government to step in. It is a ridiculous and unsustainable argument. Let me say this to the Tories today. If you think that the Scottish Parliament is better place to take those decisions—and I certainly agree with that—then let's forget the sticking plaster approach. Let's devolve control of tax credits and universal credit, and let's devolve the budgets that go with them, and then let us make our own decisions in this Parliament. The fact of the matter is that the only appropriate mitigation here is for the UK Government to abandon the two-child cap, which then renders the rape clause unnecessary. Just as it reversed cuts to tax credits two years ago in the face of mounting protests that should ditch those policies now, they are unacceptable and they are unworkable. Let me make this clear as well. They are unacceptable and unworkable, not just in Scotland. They are unacceptable and unworkable right across the UK. The Tories here had a choice on this issue—a choice of standing up for what is right or simply being a mouthpiece for the UK Government in defending the indefensible. The fact that they have chosen the latter, I think, is to their shame, and it does prove that if Scotland is looking for strong voices to protect all that we hold dear, then the last place that they should ever look is to the Scottish Conservative Party. I said at the start of this speech that this is not fundamentally an issue of party politics. It is an issue of human rights and morality. The overwhelming consensus in this chamber demonstrates that fact. Today's vote gives all of us an opportunity to reaffirm that. To reaffirm that, despite the differences that we have on so many issues, we all share a basic belief in social justice and we all recognise the importance of humanity, dignity and equality in our social security system. By doing that, we can add our voice, as Scotland's national parliament, to an outcry against the two-child policy and the rape clause that I hope will grow right across the UK. We can take a clear stand against a policy that, I would argue, has no place in any civilised society, and we can reaffirm this chamber's commitment to progressive values. For all those reasons, I urge everyone across this chamber to support today's motion in my name. Ruth Davidson to speak to remove the amendment in her name. First, let me say that I welcome this debate today, not because it is an issue that is easy to discuss in public or something to appalling never is, but because it is only right that issues of difficulty and of passion like this are debated in our Parliament here in Edinburgh. I would like to begin on a note of consensus. As politicians, I suspect that we all know survivors of rape, and I know that there are even those among us here who have been subject to sexual violence ourselves and who find the issue and even the word difficult to articulate. In the last two weeks, as this debate has emerged into the public domain, I know that many of us may include it as spoken to women who are recovering from their ordeal. We know the awful circumstances that they face, not just the terror of the attack or attacks themselves, but also the indignity of the criminal justice system that makes them and that faces them if they report the crime, the prospect of a protracted court case that follows, the criminal injuries compensation process and then the lengthy spell afterwards where women, and in some cases men too who have been attacked, have to try to pick up the broken pieces of their lives and confront the world anew. In the last few weeks, when we have talked about how we should help women in such circumstances, we have used words like sensitive and compassionate. I agree that those words do not even begin to cut it. They shrivel next to the enormity of the violation that they have suffered, and that is even more so when we face women whose rape has resulted in the birth of a child. Perhaps we do not have the words for it at all and certainly I struggle to find them. I would like to use my speech here today to try and place this issue in context. The issue of the so-called rape clause arose as a result of the welfare bill passed in the House of Commons in 2015. Those changes to welfare spending were introduced in the wake of the 2015 general election when my party set out its manifesto, a clear plan to try and put the UK's public finances back on solid ground. We all know that the UK continues to spend more than it can afford last year, borrowing to the tune of £69 billion. It is the view of those benches that, in order to restore public finances, we must eliminate that deficit and then reduce the debt mountain that we as a country have allowed to build up over a period of years. Otherwise, future generations will have to pay our debts. I'm sorry, I have a lot to get through and I won't be taking any interventions. I also don't think that this issue is one that should be subject to the knockabout that we see in here daily. This, of course, is a political judgment that any Government has to take. Labour and the SNP would not seek to curtail the growth in spending as we would, and that is their right. However, it is our judgment that we need to reduce this deficit in order to demonstrate that the UK can withstand any future shocks that may come our way and can build an economy that continues to sustain our public services. This inevitably means examining many budgets and the welfare budget is included in that. It has meant, for example, removing child benefit from higher earners, but the issue that we are debating today revolves around the further decisions taken by the UK Government to limit child tax credits to the first two children. It is worth stressing that this will not apply to existing claimants. In other words, parents of three or more children currently claiming tax credits will still continue to do so. However, I accept that, for many MSPs here, this change is far from welcome. Let me say that those are difficult judgment calls. When, in 2015, the UK Government initially proposed cutting tax credits, I spoke out against them. I did not think that ministers had got the balance right and those measures were scrapped. However, the two-child tax limit was not something that I spoke out again. Indeed, nor did others—I recall then the interim leader of the Labour Party, Harriet Harman, also making clear that she felt that it was something that should be considered. She said, we are not going to be voting against the welfare bill, we are not going to be opposing the household benefit cap, we are going to be understanding the point about more than three children. I agreed with her then and I still do. The First Minister gave monetary examples, so let me put them in context. A one-parent family with two children in which the parent works 16 hours a week at the minimum wage can claim monetary benefits of just under £19,000 a year. I added to salary and that comes to the equivalent of an earned income of £32,000. I cite those figures only to give context to the numbers that the First Minister gave. This package of reforms was voted through the House of Commons, and I note in passing that many Labour MPs abstained at stage 2 when they did so. It was then, during the consultation phase, prior to implementation that the question of exemptions was raised and it was agreed. For parents of multiple births, for children who are adopted and for the rare cases when the birth of a third or subsequent child is a consequence of rape, the UK Government agreed that the two-child restriction should not apply. I support those exemptions. Indeed, I cannot imagine that there is a single member of the chamber who does not. There may be many who disagree with capping child tax credits at the first two children, but not surely with such exemptions to the cap being put in place. The question then comes to implementation. I am sorry to say that on this issue too many people have simply not been clear with the facts. I have heard members of the chamber say on television that women must complete an eight-page form in order to receive this exemption, and that is simply not correct. On the detail of how that works, I will quote the Department for Work and Pensions consultation response on this matter, published in January. It says that neither DWP nor HMRC staff will question the claimant about the incident other than to make the claimant receive the supporting evidence from the third party profession. It adds that women are not placed in the position of having to give details about the rape to DWP or HMRC officials. I was under the impression that this was a debating chamber in this Parliament, and is it not appalling that we have the leader of the opposition in this Parliament unwilling to take a single intervention to defend one of the most heinous policies that we will ever debate in this Parliament? She should be ashamed of herself. That is not a point of order. All members know that it is entirely their own discretion whether to take an intervention or not. Ms Davidson. There is absolutely no requirement to either report rape as a crime, to provide proof of rape or proof of conviction. A woman writes her name and a third party professional who is helping the mother is asked to set out the rest. The third party model already exists in the benefit system to support victims of domestic violence. The third party professionals— It is important that we are not willfully misrepresenting the process here, causing fear and alarm, so let me outline it to the chamber once again. The woman writes her name and a third party professional who is helping the mother is asked to set out the rest. This third party model already exists in the benefit system to support victims of domestic violence. The third party professionals such as healthcare or support workers are also able to provide or sign post claimants to additional support. The First Minister and her speech talked directly of workability. Systems Advice Scotland, who have been critical—very critical of the third child restriction, said the following. Is it not the case in this debate, in any debate in this chamber, that the fact should be clearly represented? Ms Davidson said that the applicant only had to fill out their name and sign the form. I am reading from that form, page 5 of 8, where the applicant is required to put their name, national insurance number, address, declare that I believe that the non-consensual conception applies to my child, give the child's name, sign that and confirm that I am not living with the other parent of this child, even if that other parent was the person that raped the applicant. Accuracy in this debate above all else surely is in our Sandy Goddess. Thank you. I understand that the emotions are running high. That was an intervention, not a point of order, Ms Davidson. I go back and refer to the third party model and to show that it already exists as relates to domestic violence. It is the third party model being used to fill out the pages of this form. Let me come back to the point that the First Minister raised directly in her own speech about workability. Systems Advice Scotland, who I absolutely accept, has been critical of the two-child restrictions of this policy, has said this about workability. Citizens Advice Scotland is content with a third-party evidence model being sufficient to enable the exemption to the two-child restriction, where it is likely that a child has been conceived as a result of rape. Of course, I hear the concerns being raised by other charities in the sector who do not agree with this policy, and I take them seriously. That is why, in our amendment today, we also say that the implementation of these exemptions must be closely monitored as we go forward. I would like to conclude with two points. Firstly, in relation to the First Minister's motion pointing out the impact of the two-child policy, and I do not dispute the sources that she is quoting, but I ask the chamber to examine the issue of welfare reform in the round. At the moment, the UK employment rate is the highest on record. In the last year, the number of disabled people in work has increased by nearly 300,000. There are nearly 1.3 million more women employed since 2010. Also since that time, there are 828 fewer work-less households. Income inequality in this country has fallen because the incomes of the lowest paid are rising. The latest on-s data showed that the lowest paid workers are seeing their pay go up by the most by over 6 per cent last year. Median household disposable income for the poorest fifth rose by £700 last year compared to the richest fifth, whose incomes fell by £1,000. We are helping people to keep more of what they earn. Because of that, the proportion of people living in relative poverty in this country is near its lowest levels since the 1980s. Since 2010, there are 300,000 fewer people across the UK in poverty and 100,000 fewer children in poverty. Across the UK, we continue to spend £90 billion a year on supporting families, people on low incomes and job seekers. That is the record of the UK Government on welfare. Our system means that if people across the UK do not support that, they have the opportunity to ask someone else to do it on 8 June. However, for this Parliament, the question is deeper, and the question facing us is what is this Parliament for. Is it to be a soapbox to sound off against the policies from London that MSPs do not like? Is that what Scottish politics has become? Given the enormous powers that this Parliament now has, is it to act? If there is something that some in this chamber feel is abhorrent or repellent, then surely those words lose all meaning unless there is something behind it. Powers over welfare and the taxation to pay for decisions were demanded and transferred precisely so that devolved Scottish Governments could make different choices. I do not believe that any member in this chamber disagrees that women who have children in the very worst of circumstances should be exempted from restrictions on tax credit. I do not want to believe that any member would willfully misrepresent the process causing fear and alarm. However, I do believe that there are many members of other parties who would wish away tax credits being restricted to the first two children and I would point them to the legislative powers of this Parliament. For my own part, I will continue to monitor the way in which that works on the ground. The First Minister and her ministers use strong words like shameful and she has the power to act. If she chooses strong words but chooses not to act, then that would indeed be shameful. We will continue to monitor that and I will move the amendment that is in my name. I begin by moving the amendment in my name. Politics is a life that we choose because we think that we can do some good. More than that, it is because we think that it is our opinions, our views about life and those that should shake the world that we live in, which could help those who feel left behind, forgotten or are struggling and give them a voice and a belief that their opinions also count. Yes, we are all here in this chamber because we are in the business of doing good. What an ideal, what an absolute joke in the eyes of the Scottish Conservative Party. For 10 years, the Tory Government at Westminster has slashed out our valued social security system in a deliberate act of sabotage. The question that I would have put to Ruth Davidson if she had bothered to take any interventions is a question of judgment. Tell us why rape victims have to pay the price of the deficit while she gives tax cuts to the richest people in our society. The disabled, the poor, the ill, the carers of our society have all been victims of Tory austerity. I am not content with that. The Tories have now turned their grasping, grubby, miserly attention to the tax credit system, one of Labour's finest achievements. Is there no end to the Tories' desire to ensure those with the least have even less? As the casual victims of this clawing meanness, women who have two children who have had a third as a result of a rape are now at the mercy of the harsh dictance of a Government intent on dismantling the vital safety net of benefits, either admit to being raped and having a child born of this physically, mentally, emotionally scaring crime and get the financial help that you need or go without. Without doubt, the Tories' family cap is arbitrary and unfair and the rape clause that accompanies it is utterly horrific and abhorrent. I look across the chamber at Ruth Davidson, Jackson Carlaw and others, and I know that many of them have not always agreed with decisions that their party has taken in Westminster in the past. Amongst the so-called different detoxified Tories, not one of them will speak out against this latest abomination. Not one will stand up and say that they are asking rape victims to declare on a form that their child was the result of an appalling crime is just wrong. What is worse is that they even try and defend it. There is nothing fluffy about David Mundell, a man who cannot answer when asked on radio if he feels comfortable asking rape victims to fill in such a form. A man who then has the brass neck to accuse those of abhorring rape clause of playing politics with people's vulnerability and misery. There is nothing brave about Tank driving Ruth Davidson when she fails to tackle her own Government on this appalling issue and hides behind a spokesperson for days. Here is someone who is brave. I have a letter from a woman who wrote to me to tell her story about a rape and how this barbaric policy would have affected her. I have her permission to read it in full, and I have only removed references to the child's gender and the child's age. The Tories may not want to listen to me, but they surely cannot ignore her. That is what she had to say. Four years ago, one of my closest friends, someone I trusted, raped me. It happened once. I used emergency contraception but still fell pregnant. For lots of reasons, I decided that I couldn't terminate the pregnancy and went on to have a baby. The speculation about the father was awful. I accepted that I would be labelled sexually promiscuous as a result. I was prepared for that. I expected and received horrendous treatment from my husband's family. I was prepared for that. I was prepared for the financial hardship of having just been made redundant. I was as prepared as I could be for life as a single parent. What I wasn't prepared for was the impact that the labelling would have on my three existing children, born into wedlock and brought up in a stable family home. I wasn't prepared for the shame that I would feel. I wasn't prepared for the fear of anyone finding out and refusing to believe me. I wasn't prepared for the feeling that suicide was the only way out. I certainly wasn't prepared for the amount of hatred and resentment that I would feel for my own child. Years on, I have a happy, healthy child. They are worshipped, not just by me but my extended family and even better, my husband, a brave and loving man. My child doesn't know where they came from and if I have anything to do with it, they never will. Nobody knows, aside from me, my husband and the mental health nurse who helped me through this living hell. Though far from perfect and with challenges of its own, I hope that the secrecy will give them the chance to live as close to a normal life as possible. There have been so many pleas to take legal action or to widen the circle of trust to allow those who love me to provide support during the difficult times. However, this is a risk that I could never take. My need to protect my children from the truth came above all other considerations. The wider the circle of midwives, consultants, family, the less chance I had of protecting myself and my children from the permanent and damaging stigma attached to rape. I claimed tax credits from birth to 11 months old. The hand-up I needed when I was at my most vulnerable to allow me to restabilise my family. Tax credits kept our heads above water, a buffer between us and the food bank. For that, I am eternally grateful. There is no way that I could complete that awful form of shame, no matter what the consequences. Looking back, that really could have been the thing that tipped me completely over at the edge—the difference between surviving to tell the tale or not. That is the reality of the Tory rape clause, or the awful form of shame, as she puts it. That is the burden that this Tory Government wants to put on victims of rape, because it does not want to pay for more than two children in a poor family. It is an absolutely sickening state of affairs, but it is not the author of that letter or any other rape victim who should feel shame. It is those on the Tory benches here and in Westminster who refuse to act. I urge every single Tory MSP to stop and think about the ordeal that you are asking women to go through, oppose this clause and finally do some good. Annacolan Alston-Johnston, to speak to and move the amendment in her name. I am grateful that Parliament debates child tax credit cuts this afternoon, though it has made such a debate necessary and that such law has been made by the United Kingdom Parliament through Conservative votes and backing. The welfare reform and work act, which limits entitlement to the child element of child tax credit and universal credit to a maximum of two children from the sixth of this month, is the latest in an onslot, and I use that word deliberately, of UK legislation, which has negatively impacted women and children. Ruth Davidson, in a desperate defence of the indispensable, asks that we look at welfare reform in the round while lets. In gender, it tells us that of the £26 billion of cuts that will have been implemented between 2010 and 2020, 86 per cent will have been taken from women's incomes. That is the context in which we debate this today. We were some way away from gender equality before severely gendered austerity was inflicted upon us. In its analysis, the resolution foundation concluded that the poorest third of households will be worse off from tax and benefit changes starting from 6 April, despite a £1 billion giveaway. That giveaway from the public purse sees the better off half of households receive 80 per cent of the tax cut windfall and the poorest third shouldering two thirds, 67 per cent of benefit losses. The overall package of reforms, the resolution foundation tells us, adds up to a significant transfer from low and middle-income households to richer ones. Matthew Reid, the chief executive of the Children's Society, said that the announcement to limit child tax credits to two children is effectively a two-child policy for the poorest families. The Equality and Human Rights Commission in their letter to the DWP said that there is no evidence provided to support DWP's assumption that the measures will incentivise families to only have two children if they can't afford to have more. As we have heard, that policy takes no account of the fact that family situations change, jobs are lost, family members become unwell and require care, many parents are required to work part-time to care for an older relative. The fact is that the child tax credit limit, along with the overall cap on welfare benefits, fundamentally distorts our means-tested social security system, a system based on assessing people's needs and their ability to meet them. The child tax credit limit means that a family will be obsessed, and even when it is concluded that that family requires additional support, that will be withheld. The Scottish Children's Commissioner is right when he says that, when it comes to new benefit cuts for the UK Government, some children appear to matter more than others. It is no surprise that he has raised concerns regarding the rights of children affected by benefit cuts with the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. Needs will not simply disappear because Westminster has legislated. We have heard that there are several exceptions to the two-child limit, including where there is a multiple birth and in cases of adoption, but let us look at the clause that we have discussed today in most detail. I have no way of knowing whether the person who first thought of this exemption, now known as the rape clause, felt that it was a compassionate one, but surely if you get to the stage where you are asking women to prove that the child they are claiming on behalf of is a result of rape, a single brutal attack perhaps, or conceived during an on-going, abusive, coercive, controlling relationship, surely you would come to the conclusion that the implications of your legislation, of the impact on the wellbeing, the privacy of women and children are completely unacceptable. It will be personally difficult and traumatic for many women to complete this form, and it will be practically difficult, if not impossible, as Scottish women's aid and rape crisis Scotland who wholeheartedly oppose the limit and the exception and cannot and will not collude by acting as third party reporters for the DWP. The Royal College of Nursing tells us that they were not approached by the DWP in advance of its consultation on this exception and that they do not believe that it is appropriate for a nurse or a midwife to arbitrate whether a child is likely to have been conceived as a result of rape. A requirement for entitlement for the child conceived as a result of rape is that the claimant is not living with the perpetrator, so those women who are unable to leave a coercive, abusive relationship who have conceived as a result of rape will have the same pressing financial need to support a third or more child, but not the means to meet the requirements of this abhorrent clause. This wrong policy makes life even harder for those women. We know from the low reporting rates for rape that many women do not wish to disclose this information. I am wholly supportive of efforts to encourage the reporting of sexual assault and rape, but we know and we know why many women are reluctant to take this step. There is so much work yet to be done on this front, but we expect women to fill in detailed forms for the DWP. In their briefing, Scottish Women's Aid and Rape Crisis Scotland tell us, we are in no doubt that this policy will inflict harm on rape survivors. It removes their control over whom and when they speak to about their experience, and this control is known to be a critical element in a women's recovery from rape. Removing this control risks re-traumatising women. The Equality and Human Rights Commission has written to the DWP explaining their concerns regarding the cap and the operation of the exemption. With regard to the cap, it points out that children have a right to adequate living standards and that those are international rights owed by the state to the children themselves. Those rights are not dependent on the choices or the circumstances of their parents. The commission rightly criticised the DWP for lack of a properly detailed impact assessment. The on-going cumulative impact of cuts affecting women and children is a scandal and it has to stop. The Scottish Government has the powers to take action to mitigate, to make something bad less severe, as the dictionary would have it. Of course, the Scottish Government must and will look at ways to ensure that support for those affected is available, but I campaigned for a Scottish Parliament. I joined Scotland forward before I joined the Scottish Green Party. Ruth Davidson asks what a Scottish Parliament is for. It is not simply to mitigate the policies of the Conservatives at Westminster. My vision of devolution is proactive, where politicians in Scotland work together for the good of people in Scotland. Ruth Davidson, Adam Tomkins and others appear to have no vision at all of what this Parliament can be about. I support the SNP motion, the Labour amendment, and I move the amendment in my name. We now move to the open part of the debate. I call Christina McKelvie to be followed by Adam Tomkins. I am profoundly sad to say that those child tax credit cuts yet again show the harsh and cruel nature of this Tory Government, a Government that always seems to find a new law to stoop to when it comes to attacking the dignity, living conditions and income of the vulnerable. The two-child family cap is, and let's be clear about it, nothing less in malevolent social engineering. In December 2014, Ian Tomkins Smith suggested that imposing the cap would help behavioural change, and that is a quote. Think about those words. Help behavioural change. Words that carry the sinister suggestion that poor people should not have the impudence or moral right to breed. He has four children, but then he is rich, a member of the Tory elite, so he is never likely to ever call on the welfare state that he is so much loathing for. It deliberately plants the seed in people's minds that parents on lower incomes are being irresponsible. We might be shocked by this, but we shouldn't be surprised. It is, after all, the latest twist of the knife from a Tory Government that already thinks that it's okay to tell you where to live, how many bedrooms you can have, whether you get support for your disability, if you can maintain your independence through a mobility car, what and how often you eat or heat your home, whether you are under 25 and you actually get housing support to maintain a roof over your head, and now how dare, if you might dare to extend your family, the worst kind of social engineering beyond reactionary, beyond unfair and frankly, Presiding Officer, beyond belief. However, there is one part of this policy that is perhaps the most disgusting thing that we have seen from the Tories yet, and I am talking about the so-called rape clause, the one exemption to the three strikes and your out-tax policy. This clause is nothing less than a barbaric assault on women who have suffered the life-changing consequences of having had a child as a result of non-consensual sex. My tenacious colleague Alison Hewless MP found this rape clause buried in the welfare reform sum 21 months ago, but this Tory Government has ignored all of her calls for sense and even compassion to prevail. Their very own Jackson Carlaw has described the policies awkward. Awkward for who, Mr Carlaw, for your Tory party hoping to slip this through without the inconvenience of arousing hostile public interests? For you, Ruth Davidson and your other colleagues now performing excruciating contortions and a bid to sidestep responsibility for this barbarism? Will I say to Mr Carlaw and Ms Davidson, let the members of your side of this chamber hear this? For those who will find themselves trapped, humiliated and impoverished by this vicious and punitive piece of sophistry, it is a good deal more than awkward. It is devastating. Imagine if you or a member of your family find yourself already having suffered a rape or through domestic violence having to deal with this. To allow the state to use an eight-page form and yes, it's an eight-page form to snoop into the deepest recesses of your hut and your trauma. Imagine if you will, if you didn't report that rape because you just want to bury that awful memory, much like the person Kezia Dugdale spoke about. Imagine if you are still living with that abused partner who raped you. Imagine if you are in Northern Ireland and your application results under a report to the police. Imagine if you are that child named on that form. Well, we don't have to imagine, do we? This is not some dystopian story that we are talking about. It is actual Government policy right here, right now, in this so-called civilised United Kingdom. This is deeper than disgusting. It is deliberate, calculated attack, not just on women who so often bear the brunt of Tory welfare cuts but on their human rights as well. Yet the Scottish Tories here in this Parliament squat down in the bunker and hope the firestorm passes. Ruth Davidson won't even apologise, she won't even explain. She even has the audacity to suggest that this Parliament should just mitigate the damage by protecting Scottish families from the mean-minded nastiness of her own party at Westminster. That proves one thing, Presiding Officer, where there's muck, there's usually always a brass neck and there's plenty in here today. Deep revulsion stretches to the horizon and beyond on this policy. Politicians, faith leaders, women's aid, zero-tolerance, engender, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, the trade unions and child poverty campaigners and even the House of Lords. If Ruth Davidson and her colleagues want us to believe that they are capable of even an atom of compassion, they must insist that this corrosive, demeaning, divisive and bitterly unfair legislation is scrapped straight away. Presiding Officer, I want to live in a civilised country, a nation that shows its people respect, compassion and care and not one that treats its needy with suspicion, heartlessness and contempt. I say loud and I say clear today to the Tories, we don't want your child tax credit cuts, we don't want your rape clause here, we don't want it here, we don't want it in the United Kingdom, we don't want it anywhere. Scrap it now. Thank you. I call Adam Tomkins. We follow by Sandra White. Mr Tomkins, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. Survivors of rape have been to hell and back. Their very being has been violated. Women who have reported having been raped will have been subject to the indignities of the criminal justice system and may face the daunting prospect of a protracted court case. They will have experienced shame, isolation, the most complex in a turmoil that most of us cannot even imagine and these emotions will never fully dissipate during their lifetime. So to say that this is a sensitive subject that must be treated carefully may be true but doesn't even begin to cut it. In the rare cases when the rape results in a conception and the birth of a child, the issues are even more fraught. This is the context in which I want to place my remarks this afternoon. Presiding Officer, one of the first duties of government is the responsible stewardship of the nation's resources. Yet, when the Conservatives returned to government in 2010, we found that Gordon Brown's outgoing Labour administration had failed in this regard. Sorry, but there's no money left. That's what we were told. No, I'm not going to give away at the moment. That is what we were told. Please sit down. The member is not giving me. Sorry, but there's no money left. That's what we were told in that famous note left in the treasury. Putting the nation's finances on a sound footing, no, I will not give away at the moment. Putting the nation's finances on a sound footing has been the core mission of Conservative government over the past seven years. Responsible stewardship of the nation's resources is why we turned coalition into majority in 2015 and it's why we'll turn a majority of 12 into a majority many times greater than that on the 8th of June. It's the right thing to do. It's what having an economy that works for everyone means. Getting the balance right between the responsibilities of the taxpayer to contribute and the rights of claimants to benefits is a judgment. All responsible politicians have to make that judgment and it's our judgment that it is the right thing to do to restore fairness in the benefits system between those receiving benefits and those paying for them. With families relying on public support making the same financial decisions, not at the moment, making the same financial decisions as those supporting themselves solely through work and that is why from the 1st of April this year, child tax credits are limited to the first two children in a family. This will apply only to new claims. No one currently receiving tax credits will see their benefits reduced but this is the important point, Deputy Presiding Officer. I readily concede that not everyone will share our judgment that this is the right thing to do and if a majority of MSPs in this Parliament think that we've got this balance wrong and that a different policy would be the right one for Scotland, we have all the powers that we need to do something about it. Not to shout and scream but to act. We have the power to top up any reserved benefit including child tax credits and we have the resources to pay for it if that is what we choose to do. At the same time as deciding that we should limit child tax credits to two children in a family, we immediately saw that there must be exemptions. What if there is a multiple birth? What if the children are adopted from care and what about those rare cases when a birth is the consequence of a rape? Just as I support the underlying decision to limit child tax credits, so too do I support those exemptions. Because of the issues that I referred to at the beginning of my speech, it is obviously the case that the exemption as regards children who are conceived as a result of a rape is extraordinarily sensitive. It is unfortunate therefore that there is such misinformation surrounding it. I've heard it said that women will have to prove that they were raped, not the case. I've heard it said that the exemption will apply only where there has been a conviction for rape. It's not the case. There doesn't even have to have been a charge, never mind a conviction. Even the off-tripe-to-claim— Minister? Even the off-tripe-to-claim that a woman has to fill in an eight-page form reliving the horror of her assault and violation is not true. Can I ask members—I would like the courtesy of hearing Mr Tomkins, please. Is there more that we can do to support the survivors of rape and sexual assaults in Scotland? Of course there is. Yes, there is. We could, for example, increase the number of sexual assault referral centres. As Annie Wells pointed out earlier this year, there are 43 such centres in England, there are six in Wales and in the SNP Scotland there is just one. It's also the case that more than 90 per cent of projects aimed at tackling violence against women and children have suffered cuts in Scottish Government funding. Let me conclude with these remarks. It's sometimes said that the Conservatives target the poor. In a sense, that's correct. Since 2010, we have lifted 1.3 million lower wage workers out of income tax. At the same time, the national living wage has given a pay rise to 1.7 million people. Our welfare reforms hit higher income families first, not those who are worse off, by removing child benefit from families who pay income tax at the higher rate. Whereas the Labour Party had a lower rate of tax for the very richest in society, Conservatives have ensured that the wealthiest pay a greater share of tax. Under the Conservatives, income inequality is falling. Judgments about the relationship of tax to spend, decisions about getting the balance right between the responsibilities of taxpayers to contribute and the rights of claimants to welfare benefits, are difficult decisions that require tough choices. Limiting child tax credits to the first two children in a family is the right thing to do in stewarding the nation's resources. Exempting some families from this, including in cases of rape, is also the right decision. I support the amendment in Ruth Davidson's name. I would like to hear all members in the debate. I know that everybody is committed in this, but I would like to hear it and thank other members here or other members, I have to say. Sandra White followed by Alec Cole-Hamilton. Ms White, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Like many in here, perhaps not the other side over there, I enter politics because I really do believe in equality and social justice, not to punish the poor and basically reward the rich, which the Tories over here are absolutely doing through the benefit system. I find it very difficult to broach this subject, Presiding Officer. I want to give you a bit of background into why. I am amendment myself of a large family. My mother worked part-time, my father worked, he was 73 years of age. At some times, we had to rely on free school meals and the help of friends and family as well. The reason I am struggling with this barbaric, disgusting, disgraceful policy brought forward by the Tories in Westminster and defended by the Tories across here in the Scottish Parliament is that, if it was brought into force when I was born, when my family was born, where would we be now? Where would my family be, my nieces, my nephews, anyone who had more than two children? I will tell you where we would be. We would be absolutely struggling, poverty stricken, even though we were hard-working families. That is why I find it really difficult to speak about my extended family and the people who are struggling just now. That will make it absolutely worse than ever. People who are in low employment, low-wage families, many, many of them, they are no scroungers, they are no welfare or benefits, they are working hard, really, really hard and the Tories over here are punishing them because they are low paid and basically because they are women as well. I will go on to give you some statistics about that. I find it really hard to believe, and it is in the documentation as well. If you have a third child, born after 11.59pm on 5 April 2017, that child is going to be brought up in a family that is poorer, that is struggling and children that are living in abject poverty. A minute on either side, your family and that child is going to be living in abject poverty. I quote from the Tory amendment. The reason for pushing this forward is Ruth Davidson's amendment. It says in her amendment that it notes that the UK Government has a duty to manage public finances for future generations. What future generations are they protecting? It is not the future generation of families in low bay and it is not the future generations of women because that is who they are absolutely destroying and attacking. I find it absolutely disgraceful that any political party could think up something quite like that. I said I would give you facts and figures about the fact that people are not basically benefit scroungers as they all seem to think they are. In fact, of all in-work families receiving tax credits, 87 per cent of the recipients are women. For in-work single parents, 94 per cent of the recipients were women. There is a word in-work, not workless, which itself is an absolutely abomination of a word. In-work families, women, and all they are doing is getting a little helping hand, but if something happens to them, I will go into the rape clause shortly, but I would like to put that forward as well. Nobody has mentioned this. What happens if you are taking precautions and the condom happens to burst? Or you happen to be ill and the pill doesn't work? Does it tell you in this eight-page document what you do then? No, it doesn't. What happens to families and women who are stuck with that? If they have to go to the doctor and get a letter saying, I am sorry, or produce the actual bus condom or something, what happens then? Those are things that are absolutely precious to human life. I am not talking about kids being born. I am talking about the right of people of dignity and respect. Those tories over here are taking it from them and they are defending that policy, and they should be absolutely ashamed of themselves for not even standing up and sticking up for the ordinary people and women in this country. I wanted to go on to about the rape clause and what has been said. In fact, Ruth Davidson and Adam Tompkins both practically said the same speech. They both mentioned violated. Don't you think that if you go down to the DWP and you fill in this eight-page form, is that not a violation of women's rights? Is that not a further violation and yet you talk about that and you defend that? I am honestly despair. I thought that some of them were decent people who have who stand by us. In this proposal, there is no decency left in you. Have you read this? Have you seen it even? I will particularly talk about Annie Wells. I saw the bit in the paper today when she said that you are going to give reasons why you defend this. Annie Wells, you have got relatives that live in the east end of Glasgow and you come from areas where people have got more than two children who are living in low incomes. How can you possibly defend this and go out there into the Glasgow constituency and say that you stick up to the rest of people? Do you know what it says? Do you know what it says at the top of this paper? It says here that we believe in equality and diversity. Now isn't that something? That is what it says in this eight-page form that people who have women who have been raped or have been domestically abused have to fill in. We believe in equality and diversity, while I say to you that you do not believe in anything. All you believe is actually looking after yourselves and the rich and the poor and the ones who are going to suffer, and particularly women as well. Haven't you proved that you are being raped? You should be ashamed of yourselves. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I would like to start by paying tribute to the very moving personal testimony offered by Kez Dugdale and by Sandra White. I also congratulate the Scottish Government for bringing forward this motion and can assure them of the support of those benches tonight, as we will be supporting both the amendments in the name of Kez Dugdale and that of Alison Johnstone as well. Who can forget the inaugural words of Theresa May's tenure as Prime Minister when, in her own Francis of Assisi moment on the steps of number 10, she said of those families who in particular rely on tax credits and I quote, if you are from an ordinary working-class family, life is much harder than many people in Westminster realise. You have a job, but you don't always have job security. You have your own home, but you worry about paying a mortgage. You can just about manage, but you worry about the cost of living and getting your kids into a good school. I know that you are working round the clock. I know that you are doing your best. I know that sometimes life can be a struggle. The Government I lead will be driven not by the interests of the privileged few, but by yours. In the two child tax credit cap and the rate clause that underpins it, we see the measure of that commitment made flesh and I am certain that those words have now turned to ash in her mouth. There are days in this chamber when we debate matters of welfare, reform and social security, that I rise to speak with some trepidation, a recognition that there were times when my own party through dint of coalition participated in decisions and reforms that were distasteful to us as Liberals but far less egregious than those originally proposed by our partners. Members opposite rightly lose no time in reminding me of that in colourful interventions, fair enough, but the untold story of our days in coalition is what never made it to the statute books thanks to Liberal Democrat resistance, regional pay that would penalise any workers outside of the south-east of England, inheritance tax cuts for millionaires, enhanced power for employers to sack staff without notice or recourse to tribunal and, Presiding Officer, as I told the First Minister in my intervention, this abhorrent policy would have been on the statute books four years had my party not taken a stand and locked it in coalition. At no point has my party ever denied that welfare reform was needed. Indeed, the poverty alliance has said for the best part of a decade that the old system was no longer fit for purpose, but on this, as with so many other areas in this agenda, the Conservatives have got it far wrong. The policy that we debate this afternoon has rightly grabbed national attention through the rape clause, but it is the two child cap at the root of the policy that will see families drift beneath the bread line. I do not need to remind members that, in this chamber, that at present, the national outrage that is child poverty stands at some 250,000 children or more, and it is rising. Family tax credits have, next to the Lib Dem uplift in the income tax threshold, been the most effective ways of addressing in-work family poverty. I will. I wonder if the member thinks that even one Tory will have the dignity, honesty and self-respect to vote against their party tonight at the decision time. Mr Cole-Hamilton, I thank Neil Findlay for his intervention. I would very much hope so, but, sadly, I very much doubt it. As I was saying, the income tax threshold and tax credits have been the most effective means of addressing in-work family poverty, and with the pound-wakening, the cost of living rising as a result of a Tory hard Brexit, to mount an assault on tax credits now would see those numbers grow still further and far faster. It really does give the lie to the warm words of our new Prime Minister. I described the two child cap at the root of the rape clause because the cap could not exist without the clause. If you were to suggest that such a cap were necessary, and I utterly reject that it is, to bring in such a restriction without it, any exemptions would be unfair and inhumane in and of itself. That is why it is so barbaric, and what is so barbaric, about the notion of determining public policy on the basis of an upward limit on childbearing. Any such policy would inevitably lead by necessity to a rape clause. If a policy necessitates apricondition whereby women must actively prove to an employee of the state or a third party that they have been raped, then such policy has no place in a civilised society. Let us speak truthfully about the landscape in which rape survivors currently find themselves in modern Britain. As we have heard, conviction rates of rape cases, which reach court, stand at just 33 per cent. In another way, if you endure rape, one of the most life-shattering, poisonous, dehumanising acts imaginable, and you can get enough evidence to press charges through the court, you can expect to be believed about one third of the time—two thirds of the time you will not be believed. Against that backdrop, we are asking some of the most vulnerable women in our country those two terrible words that stand between them and sometimes food on the table prove it. We are asking women to reel of the trauma of that experience, in some cases years after the fact, where they might not for many reasons have reported the matter to authorities, but through sheer financial hardship must now do so. For the first time, children, as we have heard, loved to the rafters as they may be, might come to learn the dark and violent origins of their parentage due to a bureaucratic requirement in the DWP and in Whitehall. There is a human cost to all that we do in this place and in the House of Commons. There are times when economic circumstance might cause us to pass policy with which we are uncomfortable and which might cause our people harm, but there is a mace at the centre of this room, and engraved on that mace are four words around which we seek to instill humanity in all of the policy that we pass—those words are wisdom, compassion, integrity and justice—and I see none of those in the barbaric policy that we rightly condemn in the Government motion tonight. I am obligated to remind the chamber that I am a parliamentary liaison officer to the First Minister of Scotland—a First Minister who is one of four party political leaders who have led on this matter—one of four leaders in a Parliament of five political parties. On this issue, we have seen real leadership from the First Minister, Kezia Dugdale, Patrick Harvie and Willie Rennie, but not from Ruth Davidson and not, sadly, as yet from many other members of the Scottish Conservative Party. To be a leader, you cannot just hold a title. You need to show leadership. To be a leader, you cannot just think about your Tory tribe. You need to stand up for what is right. To be a leader, you need to stand up for the human rights of all the people that you represent, not just conform obediently to the UK Government and Theresa May by seeking to defend the indefensible. Presiding Officer, there are many fundamental problems with the Tory's imposition of the family cap. Most significantly, this senseless policy will increase levels of child poverty and have a disproportionately negative impact on women. As a result of the policy, according to the child poverty action group, 200,000 additional children will be pushed into poverty across the UK. According to the IFS, it will negatively affect around 600 families again across the UK. That is the population of this city of Edinburgh. It is not only children that the Tory Government is turning its back on here. Across the UK, the family cap reveals the truth that the Tories are hacking away at our benefit system with the full knowledge that their policies will adversely impact women's rights, as argued powerfully by engender and women's aid. The UK Government even admit that in its impact assessment to the Welfare Reform and Work Act 2016, where it states that, on an individual basis, women may be more likely to be affected than men. Around 90 per cent of lone parents are women. A higher proportion of this group are in receipt of child tax credits, therefore they are more likely to be affected. In effect, the UK Government feels that they only need to give a cursory nod that women will be disproportionately affected, write a tokenistic impact assessment and then ignore the impact that the family cap will have on so many. Not only do all those points make the family cap illogical and inexcusable, but the policy is also based entirely on a misguided presumption. The rape clause has rightly gathered much press attention because people struggle to understand how a political party, how people, can take such a callous attitude to other people. Yet we must not forget that the family cap is the overarching policy that has led to this outrage. Yet, even by the Tory party's absurd moral reasoning, the family cap is based on fundamental flaws. It has been pushed through with absolutely no evidence to support the DWP's assumption that this policy will in any way incentivise families to have only two children if they cannot afford to have more. It was pushed through, and I quote from the Equality and Human Rights Commission, without a sufficiently detailed impact assessment to support proper scrutiny, without any mention of the public sector equality duty, without any mention of how its aims would be achieved, without any mention of how the potential impact of the policy will even be monitored and without any mention of how adverse impacts identified after implementation will be tackled. In other words, a family cap and the rape clause contained within it is not only immoral and indefensible but also nonsensical and completely unfounded. Presiding Officer, the idea that it is in any way common for people to have children to claim social security is a damaging and unhelpful myth that politicians should be challenging, not pandering to, and certainly politicians that want to call themselves leaders. The Tory family cap is based on a very misguided and cynical world view, a false premise about the motivations and circumstances of women and men in our communities. The Tories have completely ignored the fact that any family can be hit by redundancy, illness, separation or widowhood at any time, leading to a significant loss of income. Children are born out of a multiplicity of reasons. What matters then is, yes, how loving and responsible parents are, but also how we as a society help children to grow and develop to be all they can be and give all they can give to the common good. To limit a child's life chances and aspirations based on their parents' level of income is regressive. It is remarkably misguided to imply that a person's ability to raise and care for a family should be based on their bank balance. However, the Tory family cap policy, the policy of ripping away state support for families on lower incomes that need it, is a shameful value judgment that does just that. Human rights say that we do not have a hierarchy of humanity, and so to impose an arbitrary and unjust policy like this lacks wisdom, compassion and integrity. Therefore, I urge all fellow MSPs, including Tory MSPs, to think carefully about the principles of this Parliament before you vote tonight, and do what is right. Support the Government motion, reject Ruth Davidson's amendment, support the Labour and Green amendments and let's all be leaders against this appalling and thoughtless family cap policy and the utterly important rape clause. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and I am glad to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate and add my voice to the coalition that is calling for removal of the family cap and campaigning against the introduction of the rape clause. I am grateful to all the organisations that have contacted us before the debate to tell us about the negative impact of those changes, and all those who organised and attended the rally outside Parliament last week. I want to recognise the work of Alison Thule's MP on a position to the rape clause, and I have done what I can to support that, including responding to her consultation. The welfare state is created to always support and help people in the most vulnerable and desperate situations. The child tax credit was introduced with a range of measures to tailor and focus welfare support where it was most needed. The system introduced by a Labour Government was always about supporting families, making work pay and tackling poverty. Creating a welfare system is challenging, but at the heart of that project must be supporting, not punishing people, giving people opportunities, not desperation, and offering hope and stability, not placing people into precarious situations where they cannot support themselves or their family. A welfare system that does not function properly is one that creates problems in the short term as well as the long term. The growth of food banks and food poverty, poor mental health, poor aspirations and generational unemployment are the rewards of a welfare system that is punitive. What will the impact of the family cap be? The Conservative Government has argued that it will save money and reduce the welfare budget, but the evidence shows that it is a burden that must fall disproportionately on to women and children. The engender briefing tells us that 8 to 6 per cent of net savings that are raised through the UK Government cuts to social security and tax credits will come from women's incomes. Women who are lone parents will see a loss of £4,000 a year, a 20 per cent drop in their living standards and a 17 per cent drop in disposable income by 2020. For families with more than two children, it is estimated by the Child Poverty Action Group and IPPR that up to 200,000 children across the UK will be pushed into poverty. Perversely, for a Conservative policy, 65 per cent of those families who are affected are working families. It is a policy that they claim encourages family planning, but it does not recognise the realities of modern life where families can be hit by redundancy by illness, by family separation or by widowhood—all impacting on their income, often at times you would least expect it. American states introduced the policy had to repeal it, recognising that it did not achieve its objective and that it only created greater hardship in their communities. Those UK measures are so punitive to disadvantaged and marginalised groups that they risk breaching UN treaties. The exemption to the rule that the Conservatives have introduced has only caused more concern and alarm. The exemption for women who have a third or subsequent child as a result of non-consensual conception, known as the rape clause, has created more problems, difficulties and disgust than it has solutions. The UK Government must listen to Scottish women's aid and rape crisis Scotland when it says that they are in no doubt that this policy will inflict harm on rape survivors. It demonstrates no understanding for women's experience of rape. It fails to appreciate the importance of control of the experience and the information to the survivor. It risks compromising a survivor's trust in services. It exposes the women and forces her into declaring a highly traumatic, violent experience in order to access support for herself and her children. Furthermore, the policy exemption excludes women who live with their partner, ignoring the prevalence of rape within the context of domestic abuse. It does not recognise the level of control and abuse that some women are living with in relationships. At a time when the Scottish Parliament is due to consider legislation on domestic abuse and recognise the prevalence of coercive control, the policy flies in the face of that level of understanding. It also does not recognise that disclosure to a third party leaves a woman vulnerable to repercussions from a person who has raped her, who may be her ex-partner, who may be someone who still has contact with her children. It also identifies a child and leaves that child vulnerable and stigmatised. No thought has been given to the reality for women of declaring their child as a result of rape, for an amount of money that is important to the financial survival of your family. The role of the third party is hugely problematic and even more challenging in Scotland, as organisations are making clear their intention not to provide that role. It places professionals in the role of gatekeeper, they have to verify a person's claims, they basically have to judge whether someone is telling the truth or not, which is a terrible situation in the context of rape for government to be advocating. The third party has no responsibility or training or expertise to support someone who has revealed trauma. In a strong statement, RCN Scotland has said, it is not believed that it is appropriate for the nurse or the midwife to arbitrate a woman's claim that is consistent with rape. Scottish Human's Aid and Rape Crisis Scotland have announced that they will not act as a third party reporter. The policy is in crisis and it is increasingly undeliverable in Scotland. The UK Government has pushed ahead with this policy without considering the negative consequences. Either that or they do not care about the negative impacts, they are so persuaded by their own thinking in the face of contrary evidence. I hear the Conservatives making their excuses and giving their explanations this afternoon and I don't buy it. They would make better use of their influence by joining with the rest of us to work to change the mind of the UK Government, rather than trying to justify a policy that will push thousands of children into poverty and penalise women who have already endured traumatic and often violent experiences. Ruth Maguire, last three speakers, is a tight five minutes age. Ruth Maguire, followed by Rachael Hamilton and Ms Maguire, please. Presiding Officer, the last time I spoke on social security in this chamber, the UN had recently condemned Tory welfare reform as being in grave and systematic violation of disabled people's rights. I didn't think that I could feel angrier. I didn't think that Tory policy could sink any lower, but the two-child cap and associated rape clause that we're debating today marks a new and awful Tory law. The two-cap policy is inherently wrong, groteskly out of touch with most people's experience of life and misguidedly punitive. It's stated rationale is to create a situation where people on benefits have to make the same choices as those supporting themselves solely through work. What they mean by that, of course, is that people on benefits should not have more children as they can't afford the ones they already have. Presiding Officer, this assumes that people choose poverty, that they choose low pay or irregular hours, choose redundancy or choose crisis and pain of family break-up, relationship breakdown, illness or bereavement. It's not only a ridiculous assumption, it's a dangerous one. We can't always plan for these things, we can't predict the future or guarantee our circumstances. The Tories want us to believe in the cruel and nasty notion of the undeserving poor because it suits the nasty agenda of some in their party. Presiding Officer, only a privileged few in this chamber will be so wealthy as to have always been cushioned from the bumps on the road. For the rest of us, our welfare system is a safety net to support us in times of hardship and crisis. The Tory party is fundamentally out of touch with the reality of people's lives and they can't be trusted with our social security system. This policy, like many other Tory policies, undermines the contract between the citizen and the state and it further chips away at the safety net of our social security system. It's part of a wider set of ideological reforms that have in common the beliefs that claimants are to blame for their poverty or should be punished for being poor or disabled or ill or women. Of course, no one will be surprised to hear that this abhorrent policy disproportionately damages women and children, with the two child cap predicted to leave more than 266,000 additional children across the UK in poverty by 2020. That's before we even get to the rape clause, the most detestable part of a generally loathsome policy. Despite the Tories' best efforts to convince both themselves and us otherwise, there can be no doubt that forcing women to choose between reliving emotional trauma or impoverishment is abhorrent. It's not awkward, Presiding Officer, it's shamefully abhorrent. Ruth Davidson and the Tories are seeking to defend the indefensible. Trusted women's organisations such as Rape Crisis Scotland know how distressing and difficult it is for women to disclose rape. They know the importance of trust and non-judgment in their relationship with women who seek their help. The Scottish Tories claim that rape clause is the most sensitive way to administer the exemption. Let's get real, there is no sensitive way to force a woman to prove she has been raped in order to obtain support to feed her children. Indeed, those women's organisations find the rape clause so morally appalling and so damaging to their role as support organisations that they can't and won't administer it. They won't be used as tools to get the UK Government off the hook. They will never participate in something that re-victimises women and children. That would compromise and undermine everything that they stand for and believe in. No health professionals are prepared to participate either. The Scottish Tories are well aware of that, but they continue to spread misinformation to the press, to their constituents and in this chamber. They should be ashamed of themselves. It's not always been clear whether the Scottish Tories actually support the policy or whether they are simply unwilling to criticise the UK Government. I don't know which is worse, Presiding Officer. The Tories don't normally shy away from telling us what they think is good and bad for Scotland. If they genuinely agreed with that policy, they would have debated this afternoon. They would have been extolling its virtues and engaging us with a convincing defence of the rationale behind it. They have not done that this week and have not heard a peep this afternoon. They have hidden behind spokespeople and tried to convince us that the rape clause is Tory compassion in action. Most staggeringly of all, they have tried to deflect blame and responsibility for this policy on to the Scottish Government, calling on our Parliament to clean up their party's mess and for the people of Scotland to pay twice for social security. Some are attempting to defend the indefensible and it's showing we see them. Presiding Officer, I look across there and I also see Tory colleagues who look deeply uncomfortable about this policy. I hope that they have been listening carefully to the strength of the arguments that have been made today from right across the chamber against the harmful two-child cap and the rape clause. Some of them will be able to show the courage and the strength to vote with the rest of the Parliament against this abhorrent policy. I call Rachael Hamilton to be followed by Gillian Martin and Gillian Martin, who are the last speaker in the open debate. We then move to closing speeches, of course. Ms Hamilton, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. In the summer budget of 2015, the Chancellor George Osborne set out his plans for changes to the welfare bill. 18 months on, starting on 6 April this year, child tax credits were limited to the first two children in the family. I would like to note that, for those families with three children or more and currently receiving tax benefits, their benefits will not be reduced. I would also like to set out the reasons for the changes. Firstly, following spiralling spending by a previous Labour administration, concertive efforts have been made by a Conservative Government to reduce public deficit and rebalance welfare spend, to restore fairness in the benefit system between those receiving benefits and those paying for them, with families relying on welfare support to make the same financial decisions as those supporting themselves slowly through work. I have only got five minutes, so I am afraid. Jeane Freeman. It is fair enough. We have all heard stories from constituents who work and are able to provide for their families but have to make difficult financial decisions. Child tax credits are a small part of a large jigsaw of welfare reform that aims to protect the most vulnerable in our society. Today, we discuss for what is many a sensitive and delicate issue. That is why there are a number of exemptions to protect those at risk. We have already discussed those people who are at risk, children adopted from care and those children living long term with relatives for whom tax credits are important because the alternative would be local authority care. Another exemption is to those who have given birth to children as a result of non-consexual sex. That will ensure that victims will not lose tax credit for their families through no fault of their own. Notwithstanding the strength of feeling over changes to the tax credit benefit, I would like to set the record straight over some of the recent misleading comments made by the SNP and other parties over the past week. With an election looming, it is true that, instead of protecting the vulnerable in our society, the Scottish National Party chose to use the policy to demonise the leader of the Scottish Conservative Party and twist an exemption to help those vulnerable persons into the opposite of what it is meant to achieve. The reality is that the SNP and others are choosing to debate an exemption to help people who have experienced something horrific. That debate could be to oppose the child's tax credit being limited to two children. Instead, the Government has decided to debate an exemption to that cap—an exemption that would mean that it would not impact every woman no matter what their circumstances. From the start, the SNP knew that it had the power to mitigate the two-child tax credit policy and, thus, the exemption, but it has chosen to ignore that option. Those are new powers that the SNP Government has but never uses. On a tour of the states before a New York audience, the First Minister set out how Scotland could be different as an independent country using the so-called rape clause as a point in example. What she failed to do is reveal that her Government already has the power to top up UK-wide benefits such as tax credits. Given the SNP's opposition to changes in child's tax credits, surely it would be hypocritical of them not to act. Why has the Scottish Government refused to say whether they would pay child's tax credits for three or four children? What does the SNP Government do other than attack the Conservative Government for making tough decisions in difficult times? Yesterday, Spice reported that it would cost £200 million over the next four years to mitigate the cap. That amount of money is less than the £800 million that Derek Mackay found down in the back of his sofa during his budget negotiations. Will the Scottish Government finally use the powers granted to them? As part of the welfare reform, the Scottish Government has made more decisions that have been effective—cutting income tax by more than £1,000 for typical tax-rape payers. Increasing the national living wage to give a pay rise to 1.7 million people and making sure work pays. Meanwhile, the Scottish Communist Party is on the brink of recession. Education and health remain neglected by the SNP Government. Today, I have set out the hypocrisy of the SNP Government. I have highlighted its failure to come clean over the powers that it has to axe the tax child credit. The Scottish Government consistently claimed that it does not have enough powers. That independence is necessary to make the changes in Scotland that it wishes. The truth is that the SNP Government has the powers and continually failed to use them. Rather, the SNP is continuing on a path of division and will use anything to demonise the main unionist opposition. This has not been a debate, has it? There have been no interventions taken by any of the Tories. Most of them have been sat on their phones with their heads down. It is the last of the opening speeches and I have not got much time, but I will give you the opportunity to intervene in me on one condition, that you take this chance to stand up and say, actually, that I have been convinced by the arguments put forward by the rest of the benches today and that I am going to stand up for women and families. Any takers? Over one million children will be affected by this dreadful policy. This policy that has been said is set to save the UK Government £1 billion per year. How much does tax evasion and avoidance cost the UK a year? 34 billion. When Adam Tomkins talked about that little note, that so-called note that David Cameron reckoned that they found in the Treasury, and it said that there was no money left, on the back of it, did it say, get it from the vulnerable, get it from the poorest in society? No, it did not. The UK Government agreed to make all laws in accordance with the convention for the UN rights of the child when it was ratified in 1991, and I would argue that this policy directly contravenes that convention. One, it states, no child should be subject to arbitrary or unlawful interference into the privacy, yet a mother must confirm to a third party stranger that they have been raped to access funds for their child. Who is that third party? You are asking for more centres for support. Will the centres that exist that provide support to women who have been raped to rape crisis and women's aid have refused to have anything to do with your other violent policy? Has the Government considered the psychological trauma that this will result in as a declaration to the child at the point of assessment or later on in life? Two, the convention also states that all children should benefit from social security. It does not say that only the first two children of a family should benefit, and that policy means that there is no link between a child's need and the support that they get. The UK social security advisory committee has commented that the DWP faces complex challenges in ensuring that the proposals are delivered in an effective, fair and safe way. The flagged-up concerns about privacy, the requirement that women are not living with their alleged perpetrator and how the third party decision model will work in practice. Even the Church of Scotland has condemned this policy. The clause is unworkable as it is abhorrent. The Tories say that the family cap will make families think about whether they can afford to have children. There is so much wrong with that statement that I would use up all my time on this alone. Let's just say that I agree with Christina McKelvie on that. But I assume that I have covered all the moral grounds around who is the right to procreate according to the Tories and jump to this point. Regardless of a family situation at the time of conception, things can and do happen to a family. A parent loses a job, a parent dies, a parent becomes incapacitated, a parent abandons a family leaving the family to struggle. There are not many families in this country that can go the loss of one wage for more than one month before they encounter severe difficulty. In the case of families with terminally ill parents or who have just lost a parent, there is the dual assault that is made in them by this Tory UK Government who are cutting bereavement support. Last week, one of the architects of universal credit, Devon Jelani, got in touch with me. He produced a paper that assesses the impact of tax credits to third and subsequent children. The paper says that the two-child limit to tax credits will set to drive child poverty up by 10 per cent in the next three years. The behavioural impact of the policy remains unclear, but we know that the costs of poverty are significant. The costs of this policy will ultimately fall on the children in the families that are affected. He was, of course, talking in terms of the UK population. This is one of the reasons that I take massive exception to the stock response to the Tory benches in this place to this issue. To quote Ruth Davidson last week, if the First Minister does not like the two-child policy, she can change it. Aside from the issue of the hypocrisy of the Scottish Government being asked yet again to clear up a Tory mess, this is a moral outrage. What of the children and families that are driven into poverty across the UK? Who is going to speak for them? Who is going to stand up for them? This policy needs to be scrapped at source. This policy needs to be scrapped for the sake of women, families and children across the UK. This policy needs to be scrapped for the good of all children subjected to the effects. I call Ross Greer to close the green six minutes please, Mr Greer. Colleagues across almost all of this chamber, I am grateful that we have made time to debate the child tax credit cuts and the rape costs today, but I cannot describe my horror that we have to do so. That the Conservative party has implemented something so cruel, so utterly revolting, that even their own most extreme members can barely muster a defence, and did not Ruth Davidson's contribution today expose that so well? The mask that she so carefully constructed to create an acceptable face of her party has well and truly slipped. Ruth Davidson has spent years trying to convince voters that Tories are the nasty party no longer, but when you cut through the tank-riding bagpout playing bravado, you can see that Ms Davidson is just another cruel member of a cruel party. Or worse, or worse, that she does disagree, but the famously honest and plain-spoken politician is too cowardly to say so. That is nothing new, though. Time and again, the Tories go after the most vulnerable people in society to impose the cost of austerity on those least able to bear them. Already, they have hammered people with disabilities. While Ruth Davidson is posing on top of mobility scooters, her party is taking away 800 mobility cars a week and leaving disabled people isolated. While she is out there claiming that Theresa May has helped women, the Tory party is forcing rape victims to jump through invasive bureaucratic hurdles just to claim basic support. As Alison Johnstone has mentioned, 86 per cent of the £26 billion worth of cuts that are implemented or planned for this decade have or will hit women. The Tories have once again become the party of child poverty, already nearly one in four children in the UK living poverty. That is four million in one of the richest countries in the world. Just today, a new report highlights that three million children are at risk of hunger over the school holidays, and now the child poverty action group estimates that a further 200,000 will enter poverty from this policy alone. What does that matter when Tory party donors are getting their tax cuts? I thought it hard to stoop even lower than what we have already seen with cuts to people with disabilities, cuts that have killed. Yet that is exactly what the Tory parties managed to do. They are content to force women who have been through the horrific trauma of rape to relive it. They danced around that point today, but I will happily give some of my time to Ruth Davidson if she wishes to clarify why, Ruth. Do you want survivors of rape to potentially give up their anonymity to disclose their experience to a complete stranger? Why do you think they need to relive the trauma? Tell me, tell the public, Ms Davidson. Why? No, that is not surprising, cowardly, but not surprising. There is a clear risk that others that they know will find out, friends and family who they may not have wanted to know. There is a risk that their child will find out once they are old enough to understand the welfare system. So much stress and anxiety imposed on vulnerable women and their families to do what? To take money away from children. That is everything that I have ever seen the Tory party as, but rarely has it been so blatant. That is a policy that undermines basic human rights to privacy, to family life and the rights of children. I am aware that Alison Thewlis MP, who we must all give her thanks to for leading this campaign, has written to the UN to request another investigation of this Tory Government on human rights grounds. That is a UK Government that claims third-party experts will handle the rape cause sensitively, yet many women's organisations have ruled themselves out of that role. That is the Royal College of Nursing. They have raised many valid concerns about how the policy would undermine their relationship with the people that they are trying to help and undermine the vital service that they provide to victims. I would ask Rachael Hamilton. Why are rape crisis Scotland, Women's Aid, the Royal College of Nursing, the child poverty action group, the Equalities and Human Rights Commission and so many others wrong on the Tory party right? Why, Ms Hamilton? No. Ruth Davidson called for the facts to be clear. I agree, so I have to point out to both Ms Davidson and Adam Tomkins that they have, and I assume by ignorance rather than malice made an incorrect statement in this debate. They said that they do not need to report rape as a crime to claim tax credit, but that is not entirely the case. In Northern Ireland, under the 1967 Criminal Law Act, it is mandatory to report serious crime. So what situation will women there now be in? The Conservative Party have talked a lot about the powers of this Parliament, powers that it never wanted us to have in the first place, and expect us to act. This Parliament was not designed to simply act as the last line of defence against the cruelty of Conservative Governments at Westminster. That is not our role. The role of this Parliament is to improve the lives of the people of Scotland, not to implement desperate last-minute measures to prevent them from getting even worse. Some colleagues on the Conservative benches are here because of their belief in the union rather than an enthusiastic conservatism. I respect that, but is that what you all wanted to spend your parliamentary careers defending? Is that what my colleagues in the west of Scotland, Jamie Greene, Maurice Corry, Maurice Golden and Jackson Carlaw, are really here to defend the rape cause? I do not believe that it is why Jackson Carlaw is here because he admitted this weekend that the policy is awkward. As Christina McKelvie has pointed out, it may be politically awkward for the Tories, but it is an intolerable trauma for rape victims across this country. Policies designed to limit families to two children exist only in a few places—Vietnam, Iran, China, Singapore and now the UK. As the Conservatives here in the Parliament, do you want to go down in the history of the Scottish Parliament as having voted in defence of this? You were elected on the banner of being a strong opposition. If you cannot oppose the rape cause, what on earth can you oppose? I call Pauline McNeill to close for Labour. Six minutes, please, Ms McNeill. How did the Tories get themselves into a position of defending a clause that is now and forever will be known as the rape clause? How did the Tory leader find herself in full flow this afternoon, for I think about two minutes discussing the inadequacies of the criminal justice system for rape victims? How is it that they now find themselves at odds with all the agencies who would be the third parties meant to report and administer it? How is it that any right-thinking person could ask the agencies to judge whether a woman has been raped that has not gone to court? You could not make it up. This is absolutely, as many women and men have said in this chamber, if you cannot see it, it is excruciating to watch, to be perfectly truthful with you. It is a full frontal attack on women and women's lives. It is a full frontal attack on the poorest women and it is a full frontal attack on poor women who have been raped. Why can you not see this? Some of the speakers on the other side seem to understand the high sensitivity of a rape victim, and I do not doubt that who falls pregnant. However, you will not make the jump to trying to understand the insensitivity of asking that woman to complete a forum, to go through the same ordeal again, to come forward and say that she was raped. The story that Kezia Dugdale talked about is not the story, but the women who wrote to Kezia Dugdale. I am pretty sure that there are many women who would not be prepared to put themselves through it, not just because of the ordeal, but I just do not think that they prepared to put themselves through it as a matter of principle. It is a policy that I think will fail. It is reduced to arguing for more sexual assault centres, which I think we would all agree. But really, is that your defence? Interestingly, the Tory motion says that it is designed to protect future generations. I think that Sandra White said that. I find that really ironic to say the least, because if it had the desired effect, that future generation is certainly going to be a lot smaller if that is what you believe. In fact, we have had debates in this chamber about the need to grow the population. We have had debates in this Parliament about the need and the Brexit debate to support families and the growth of families. In Scotland, we know that one of the big issues in the economy is the reduction in the population. It is really quite staggering. What you have done in defending this is that you have completely overshadowed the policy that you are trying to defend in the first place, and that is the two-child policy. The IFS said that families can expect to lose about £5,000 of income by 2020-21. It has gone to say that 80 per cent reduction in pay is measured by assessing what pay might have been if the 2008 crash had not happened. I said recently that wage stagnation has been worse than Britain since the 1830s. It is that factor that pushes more and more families into poverty, and they are not responsible for the financial crash. I think that it was Ben Macpherson who said that. I think that this is an important point. Anyone of us can find ourselves in the situation where we are not here, where we are not in the job or we are made redundant. Anyone of us could be in the position where we need child tax credit. The child tax credit system is probably the biggest single measure that is lifting children out of poor lives, and removing it, the child policy in itself, will make sure that thousands of families will find themselves in poverty. It is unfair, but it is also stupid at a time of economic uncertainty. We have all seen the forums in advance of the debate, and this is what it looks like. It is quite clear that you have to complete your name and your national insurance number, give your address and declare that I believe that the non-conceptual conception applies to my child. I think that it was Claire Baker and Ruth Macpherson who said that the stigma that could be attached to the unborn child, who is the child in question in the forum, beggars belief that you would have a Government policy that would encourage that. On the question of multiple births, I had to read that at least three times to see if I have read it. For example, if you already get child tax credit for two or more children and you have twins, you will get the child element for one of the twins. If you have triplets, you will get the child element for two of the triplets. I mean seriously. The policy is in crisis. Wherever it started off, can the Tory members not see that it is in crisis? Women who are raped or coerced? A woman who has not had the courage to leave that abusive relationship, what makes her think that she is going to have the courage to come forward and complete this shameful forum? It is really unbelievable. The Parliament has the powers—I will conclude by saying this—to do this, yes, undoubtedly. Devolution has been a protection in many policies. Rachel Hamilton said that we, the other parties, are accusing or trying to demonise the Tories, but I think that you are making a very good job of it yourself, to be perfectly honest. You have time to consider. If Theresa May wants to look at those families who are just managing and do not forget, families who are affected by it are those very families who are just managing. Do the right thing for the country, do the right thing for women, and do the right thing here in this Scottish Parliament. Speak up for Scottish women. I ask the Tories to reconsider their position on this tonight in the vote. Thank you very much. I close for the Scottish Conservatives in what has been an emotional and passionate debate. I begin by acknowledging that none of us here today can overstate the appalling, brutalising nature of rape as a crime. It is without doubt devastating for the victim, and I simply cannot add to what others across the chamber have said about its traumatic effects. Making any changes to a support system such as tax credits was always going to create fierce discourse, but all of us should bear in mind that we are talking about real people and the effects of policy upon them. They are not served by partisan politics or by exaggerated statements about how the specific aspects of the new policy will work in practice. I would like to set a few things straight, because some things have been said and continue to be said that require correction, or at the very least require to be put in context. One phrase that has been used, which I take issue with and find its way into the Government motion, is the expression, proving rape. Let me describe what proving rape means to me in the light of working in our criminal courts when first training and then helping to prosecute sexual offences as an advocate. To successfully convict and accused of rape, there must be proof beyond reasonable doubt. That is the very highest standard of proof our law can insist upon. It is well known how difficult it is to secure convictions in rape trials, as Alex Cole-Hamilton gave the statistics. However, it is worth reminding this chamber what happens when the victim of an alleged rape gives evidence in court. Although the court is normally closed to the public and the victim gives evidence, shielded—no, I am not going to give way. Shielded from the accused— Please let's hear the member. Let's hear the member have the courtesy to hear his arguments. While the court is normally closed to the public and the victim gives evidence, shielded from the accused by screens, she will remain in full view of the jury, not to mention lawyers and staff. She will remain in full view of 15 men and women. You may think that the description of a rape victim giving evidence requires it to you. I think that we are here today to discuss very serious issues. I do not think that any of us are here today to listen to a lecture about the justice system. We are here to deal with the nonsense of the child cap and the rape clause. Could the member please address that? Please sit down. I understand that the member will be linking this into his points in the debate. The expression of proving rape is what I was considering and asking the chamber to listen to. However, I stress that I make these points not to contrast them with what is required by the policy here. Those are plainly different processes with different purposes that cannot properly be compared in practice, but context is critical. My plea today is for a sense of perspective, however hard that may be when dealing with such sensitive and complex issues, not just in terms of the substance of the arguments but in the words we use and the language that we deploy. The Government's motion is fundamentally wrong when it says that the policy will force victims of rape seeking to claim child tax credits to prove to the UK Government that their child was born as a result of non-consensual sex. With respect, it is no such thing. No one is forced to do anything by the form, let alone prove to the UK Government that a child was born as a result of non-consensual sex. Just a minute, Mr Cameron. For the avoidance of doubt, it is up to the member where he takes an intervention. If he does not want to take an intervention, he does not need to take an intervention. You will understand that I raised that point with great caution, but I do not think that Mr Cameron had the opportunity to say to Mr Harvie if he was going to accept or reject his point of order. I thought that you perhaps jumped in a bit early. You are being presumptuous, Mr Swinney. Do not tell me my job. I could tell that Mr Cameron was not prepared to take that point of order, and time is tight. If I am wrong, Mr Cameron, would you clarify where you are going to take that point of order? No, he was not. I accept the point of order, Mr Finlay. The Presiding Officer of this Parliament is engaging in a discussion around parliamentary reform. That is a very important issue. Is not the behaviour of the Conservative Party in this debate something that the Presiding Officer should look at because we are the leader of the Opposition, a professor and an advocate unwilling to take any interventions of anyone in this debate? That brings this to Parliament. That is not the point of order, Mr Finlay. Please sit down. I have been in this Parliament for many, many years and I have been in many debates where members have never taken points of order. It may not be a happy situation. That is a matter for members. I make no comment. I accept that, unequivocally, the form requires declaration by the claimant of child tax credit that the exception applies and that the child in question was born through non-conceptual conception, including rape, but that is not proving rape to the UK Government. In terms of the third party professional, let us be clear about what is required here. The third party professional must confirm that having been contacted by the claimant, her circumstances are consistent with it being likely that the child was conceived through an act by another person to which the claimant did not agree. Likewise, that is not proving rape to the UK Government. Further, far from being abhorrent, the third party professional model, as a means of supporting women, is already being used to support victims of domestic abuse and is proven to be effective. Third party professionals support domestic abuse victims and sign them post them to benefits such as housing benefits for a refuge. Deputy Presiding Officer, we all know that one of the inevitable aspects of Scottish politics is a relationship between Holyrood and Westminster. On those benches, we are all used to the criticism levelled at the UK Government over the last seven years. The times when that criticism was most potent was when a welfare or tax policy was being imposed on Scotland unilaterally without any ability for Scotland to plough a different furrow. In those circumstances, the outrage expressed was understandable even if there was disagreement about the ultimate direction of travel, but not here. Not with this. As has been said by others, the Scottish Government has the powers at its disposal to change this policy if it chooses. It is time for the Scottish Government to take responsibility by all means, express outrage, by all means howl at us, by all means, cry shame, but when you have the power to change this, at least have the courage to step up to the plate and offer Scotland an alternative. Thank you, Mr Cameron. I call on Angela Constance to close to the Government. Cabinet Secretary, nine minutes please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. The Tories may have attempted a more emollient approach today with more convivial tones, and apparently it is all just a great misunderstanding, or a mendacious misrepresentation by those benches. Or, in the words of Jackson Carlaw, it is all just a little bit awkward. Jackson Carlaw, for many years, has been a big champion of the Jewish community. In the Jewish community, 52 per cent of the community have two or more children. I would suggest to Mr Carlaw that that is a bit awkward. In the Muslim community, 60 per cent of people have more than two children, and that compares to 30 per cent to the rest of the community. The Tories are attempting to defend the indefensible, or more accurately, deflect in the Scottish Government or indeed the last Labour Government. Make no mistake about it. The mask has well and truly slipped. The toxic Tories are back, and they are back with vengeance. If they get away with this, if they get away with the rape clause and the two child policy, they will think that there is no stopping them. In this Parliament, we feel different, because the rage and the passion at the injustice, on the SNP benches, on the Labour benches, on the green benches, on the Liberal benches, is absolutely palpable. The two child cap on tax credits and universal credit—we should not forget that—and the rape clause are nothing short of a mendacious interference on family life that breaches the human rights of women and their children. Indeed, it turns the clock back on equality and it turns the clock back to the 1970s in terms of fighting poverty and inequality. For me, worst of all, it represents dog-whistle politics of the very worst kind. We have to ask ourselves, what is it that the UK Government is really saying? Are they saying that having more than two children is only for those and such of those? Is it only for the likes of the Deputy First Minister of Scotland to have three children? Is it only for the likes of Professor Tomkins to have four? Is it only for the likes of the Presiding Officer to have six or seven children? What they are saying, and Ruth Maguire hit the nail in the head, is that, if you hit upon hard times, become unemployed, do not earn a great wage, that there will be no safety net for your third or subsequent children. What they are saying is that you do not deserve support, and that is an assault on the poorest, and it is an assault on the poorest that are either in or out of work. Make no mistake about it, the UK Government's cuts are having a hugely damaging and disproportionate impact on women because we know and the Treasury know that women are twice as dependent on social security as men. The cuts hit women the hardest. 75 per cent of the cuts since 2010 have come directly from the pockets of women. The two-child limit will impact on 54,000 families, the length and breadth of Scotland, by 2021, and, as Pauline McNeill says, will increase child poverty by 10 per cent. How is this, in the words of the Tory amendment, managing public finances carefully for the future generation? What this is, it is balancing the books on the backs of the poor. As Sandy Brindley from Great Crisis Scotland said, the last thing a woman needs is to have to face a decision whether to disclose or to be able to feed their children. Do the Tories not understand this or do they just not care? All of that is an example of what happens when women are missing or underrepresented in the decision making process. Let me be clear that this Parliament is fundamentally opposed to the two-child cap in its entirety. We believe that all children should be supported, not just the first two, and they should be supported if and when their families need it and when their families need it most. I believe that this Parliament is clear that there are never any circumstances in which it is acceptable for a woman to have to disclose that she has been raped to receive a benefit. The UK Government seems to think that it is acceptable to have an eight-page forum with large and emboldened words on the front saying, support for a child conceived without your consent. Not a forum that is Jackson Carlaw to BBC Radio Scotland would simply mean that women would have to declare to their GP or another health professional the circumstances in which they had conceived their child. Or, indeed, Ruth Davidson's assertion on BBC TV Scotland that all they, the women, have to do is just write their name in a box. To Donald Cameron, I say turn to page 2 of this eight-page forum and you will see what women are asked. They are asked if they have a conviction against them, if the perpetrator has a conviction against them. They are asked if they have received criminal injuries, and if none of that above, they have the indignity of having to seek out a third party assessor to disclose some of their most innermost and private matters. Let me say to Ruth Davidson that if a woman has to tell anyone that they have been raped, that they have been abused, that they have been coerced or that they were in fear of violence or in fear of their lives, it is never ever as simple as a case that all they have to do is to write their name. They must relive that rape, they must relive that abuse, relive that violence and they must tell a person, no matter how sympathetic they may be, that their child is the result of abuse. Imagine having to put your child's name in that box because once it's there you can't take it back and that is the reality of the rape cause. Let me say to Jackson Carlaw, good luck with finding a health professional, a social worker or a third sector organisation who will participate with this ideologically driven nonsense, and let me say to the UK Government, I hope you don't even think about laying this upon DWP staff or indeed asking ATOS or some other private contractor to do your work for you. Don't even think about going there. If we turn to page 5, Mr Cameron, in this forum people have to confirm that they are not living with the parent who raped or coerced them. Have the Tories never heard of rape within marriage? Have the Tories never heard of coercive or controlling relationships? The piece to resistance is page 7 where professionals are asked the question, are the claimant's circumstances consistent? Are their claimants' circumstances consistent with what this is dog quistle politics that's gone back to the days of deserving and undeserving women? I appreciate that given that I wanted to ask Donald Cameron about this but clearly the policy today is that they are not allowed to take interventions. If a woman isn't believed, because why? Frankly, when we talk about rape and sexual violence, often women are not believed or women are blamed for what's happened to them and asked to justify it and what were they wearing etc. If a woman isn't believed or she does get the benefits but later someone makes a complaint and there's going to be an investigation because let's face it, we've all had surgeries as councillors or as MSPs and that's what happens. Has the UK Government provided any guidance whatsoever or explanation about how that's going to be dealt with compassionately and in context? Cabinet Secretary? No, they haven't and the hard facts of the matter are, you can't implement the so-called rape clause extension compassionately, it is just not possible. On the point of domestic violence, this Parliament has led the way in tackling violence against women and girls. It started with the Labour-Liberal Coalition and that work has continued under this Government. We have led the way. That doesn't mean that there is not more to do, we've invested record levels of funding but it's not right that the Tories should use this as a deflection to try and defend the indefensible and to point away from their own record. I want to briefly to say something about the issue of mitigation. I have never, at all of the debates that I've participated in this Parliament, I've never demurred from the debate about what more we can do with the powers and resources that we have and I never will but in fairness we need to acknowledge some things and as Alison Johnston says, mitigation is about making something less severe. It is not to reverse stop or change and Gillian Martin was absolutely right that this should be stopped at source not just for women in Scotland but for women and children across the UK and it is always worth remembering what we already mitigate. Since 2013-14 we've invested over £350 million to fully mitigate the bedroom tax. We've helped over 241,000 individual households, a third of whom have children, through the Scottish welfare and we've invested £1 billion in the council tax reduction scheme, helping almost half a million households each year to meet their council tax. So when will the Tories stop expecting us to pick up the pieces? When will they do that? When will they stop treating this Parliament as a handmaiden, as a handmaiden that has to pick up the pieces of broken lives? Kezia Dugdale was right. She said that the purpose of this Parliament was about making a difference, it was about giving people hope, it was about giving people a lifeline and it was about giving people a voice. So tonight, Presiding Officer, we should not and must not let the Tories off the hook with regard to their responsibilities. Because in 2015, when cuts to child tax credits and the imposition of the two child limit were announced by George Osborne, Ruth Davidson made a big deal about how she wasn't afraid to stand up to London ministers. She even said that if there was a real practical human problem and then that the Government needed to look at that again, well we have a real practical human problem and we have a problem now and it needs to stop. And it's always a significant moment, Presiding Officer, when the SNP, Labour, Greens and Liberals stand united against the Tories, irrespective of our differences, whether we're a nationalist, a unionist or a federalist or something else, we are all united in opposing the two child cap and the abhorrent rape clause as anti-women, anti-child, anti-family and fundamentally wicked. Ruth Davidson says that the Tory Government has a mandate. Well they don't have a mandate in this place and they're not doing this in our name. So now is Ruth Davidson and the Tories opportunity to stop digging, to stop deflecting, do the right thing, stand up for women, stand up for children, stand up for families across the United Kingdom and join us and demand that the UK Government rip up their rape clause. That concludes the debate on child tax credit cuts and I'll allow a few minutes for the front benches to change places for the next debate. Thank you.