Motion and Vote
After Churchill's speech the House divided. The motion was "That this House do now adjourn" and constituted a vote of confidence.
| Yes votes | 281 |
|---|---|
| No votes | 200 |
The Government's notional majority was 213 but 39 Government supporters voted with the Opposition, and some others abstained. The Government still won the vote by 281 to 200, but the catastrophic fall in the Government's majority put great pressure on it. A Labour MP Josiah Wedgwood led the singing of Rule Britannia, joined by Conservative rebel Harold Macmillan of the Noes; this gave way to cries of 'Go!' as Chamberlain left the Chamber.
Read more about this topic: Norway Debate, May 8
Famous quotes containing the words motion and/or vote:
“When desire, having rejected reason and overpowered judgment which leads to right, is set in the direction of the pleasure which beauty can inspire, and when again under the influence of its kindred desires it is moved with violent motion towards the beauty of corporeal forms, it acquires a surname from this very violent motion, and is called love.”
—Socrates (469–399 B.C.)
“When Abraham Lincoln penned the immortal emancipation proclamation he did not stop to inquire whether every man and every woman in Southern slavery did or did not want to be free. Whether women do or do not wish to vote does not affect the question of their right to do so.”
—Mary E. Haggart, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 3, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)