A COVENTRY MP has sent Jacob Rees-Mogg a copy of Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol after he was branded Scrooge for controversial comments on Unicef.
The Tory cabinet member has been widely criticised after saying Unicef should be “ashamed” for offering help to families living in poverty in the UK.
It follows a heated exchange with Zarah Sultana, the Labour MP for Coventry South, who, during Business Questions in the House of Commons last week, highlighted that for the first time in its 70-year history, Unicef is helping to feed disadvantaged children in Britain hit by the Covid-19 crisis.
Mr Rees-Mogg responded: “I think it’s a real scandal that Unicef should be playing politics in this way when it’s meant to be looking after people in the poorest, the most deprived countries in the world, where people are starving, where there are famines and civil wars.”
He continued: “It is a political stunt of the lowest order… Unicef should be ashamed of itself.”
Ms Sultana slammed the Leader of the House of Commons for his “disgraceful” reply to her question.
Speaking afterwards, she said: “For the first time ever Unicef, the UN agency responsible for providing humanitarian aid to children, is having to feed working class kids in the UK. But while children go hungry, a wealthy few enjoy obscene riches, from Tory donors handed billions in dodgy Covid contracts, to people like the Leader of the House, who is reportedly in-line for an £800,000 dividend pay out this year.
“So will he give government time to discuss the need to make him and his super-rich chums pay their fair share, so that we end the grotesque inequality that scars our society?
“It’s no surprise Rees-Mogg is totally detached from the struggles of working class families – he’s an old Etonian, former hedge fund manager, now estimated to be worth more than £100 million. He and his Tory mates have no idea what life is like for working people.”
Ms Sultana sent Mr Reese-Mogg a Christmas gift – a copy of Charles Dickens famous 1843 novella A Christmas Carol highlighting child poverty in Victorian England, with the message:
‘Jacob, It appears this wasn’t on Eton’s reading list. Merry Christmas, Zara.’
Posting the inscription on Twitter she said: “The Speaker encouraged me to show “Christmas spirit” to Jacob Rees-Mogg. His comments to me about Unicef don’t deserve it, but I thought I’d try all the same.”
