As?pupils return to the classrooms again today (November 2) over the weekend the Pembrokeshire People’s Assembly group staged an ‘empty plates’ protest outside the constituency offices of both Stephen Crabb MP and Simon Hart MP on Saturday, following what The People’s Assembly describes as ‘The scandal of their free School Meals votes’

Due to current Covid restrictions, the protests were carried out by just two protestors at each location who lived locally enough to each office to enable them to carry out the demonstrations whilst on their daily exercise round or while out purchasing essential items.

Due to Covid the messages written on each of the plates were all sent in by local ’would be’ protestors following a call out on social media.

A few select plates were left at Mr. Crabb’s office while the majority were left with Secretary of State for Wales, Mr. Hart after the second demo.

Pembrokeshire People’s Assembly stated: “We have had a huge amount of support for this demonstration and under normal circumstances would have called for a conventional style demo on the streets to go along with the ‘empty plates’ stunt.

“With the level of support that we have received and the visceral anger that is out there following Crabb and Hart’s votes, we know that this would have been very well attended, however, these are not normal times so this called for a more creative and Covid appropriate response.”

The protest comes following a flurry of announcements from pubs and restaurants around Brittain stating that they have barred Tory MPs following their votes against protecting free school meals during school holidays, including two pubs in Fishguard who have now banned both Crabb and Hart for life.

A spokesperson continued: “The Tories, as ever, are determined to make the poorest and most vulnerable in society pay for the crisis.

“This latest move shows the utter contempt that the Conservatives hold for those people who work all hours to keep our society afloat in times of crisis.

“The vast majority of those who claim free school meals are those families who are working yet on low incomes, this is an issue of poverty pay, not benefits.

“Simon Hart voted against the amendment which would have protected free school meals during holidays for children in England.

“Stephen Crabb, who was himself brought up on benefits, and who has almost never voted against his Party whip and certainly never voted against austerity ‘abstained’from the vote, he says ‘in protest’, however, a true ‘protest vote’ would have been to vote against the government not just sit on the fence and pretend to have a backbone.

“In our eyes, Crabb’s abstention is actually a worse indictment of his character as it shows he will not stand by any political convictions he claims to hold!”

“Fortunately for the children living in Crabb and Hart’s own constituencies, the Labour led Welsh Government has ensured that children will get free School meals over the holidays.”

“Empty plates protests have taken place outside the offices of Tory MPs all around Brittain and we expect to see many more, there is also a growing movement of pub owners barring Tory MPs from their premises which we think sends a clear message of disapproval to the Government and a clear warning to the MPs who voted to keep children hungry over the School holidays,” they added.