Parliamentary Representation

Lord Blunkett Excerpts

Thursday 27th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Blunkett (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South (Dame Anne Begg) on securing the debate. She was extremely modest, however, because she has been assiduous and tenacious in following through on these matters since she was vice-Chair of the Speaker’s Conference, albeit that she chaired it under the previous Speaker and then under your tutelage, Mr Speaker, after you were prepared to pick up the cudgel when you came into your position. You carried the conference forward and have given support since then including, of course, through the parliamentary placement scheme that you and my right hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Hazel Blears) have pushed forward. I am pleased to have a paid intern in my office under that scheme, who happens to be female, which is beneficial in my speaking in the debate.

My hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South must not hide her light under a bushel, because not enough people keep pushing this issue. I often nip myself and think, “Why aren’t I doing more to speak about this, or to put forward publicly ideas of what we might do?” I should, however, declare a non-pecuniary interest: I am helping to establish the Bernard Crick centre at Sheffield university—it is named after my old tutor, Professor Sir Bernard Crick—which is also called the centre for the public understanding of politics.

We had high hopes that the Cabinet Office, linked to the Deputy Prime Minister’s office, would be prepared to do more. We keep hearing that it will, but after the schemes are put up, they seem to disappear like sand between fingers. I understand that money has been diverted to be handed over to local authorities to address the critical issue of electoral registration, given that Parliament was getting into a mess regarding people being discouraged from registering, but we need to spend even modest sums to encourage political engagement from the earliest years.

The hon. Member for Stourbridge (Margot James) is right that it is vital that we encourage young people at school to be interested in politics and citizenship and that they receive proper unbiased tutoring in those subjects. I was very pleased that the Secretary of State for Education—I do not often say that—took a step back and did not remove citizenship from the school curriculum, but there is still a discussion behind the scenes about parity with other curriculum subjects and the timing of any review of programmes of study. I hope that that will be sorted out between the Department and Ofqual as quickly as possible because, as the hon. Lady rightly said, we often pick this up too late. If young people are turned off from the whole idea of public engagement—not just standing for a council seat or this place, but being engaged in campaigns and activities that we would all see as crucial dynamics in a living civil society—we will lose them. By the time people start having children and commitments, it can often be too late.

[Dame Anne Begg]

When I was listing the things that have improved, I failed to acknowledge the improvement to the parliamentary education service and not only its outreach work, but what it does to bring people to this place so that we can break down some of the barriers.

[Mr Blunkett]

I agree entirely, and I am pleased that the education centre has been granted planning consent. I hope that there will be a route to it, Mr Speaker, because I am strongly in favour of the service, and support and participate in its programmes. I am pleased that your efforts and those of the Lord Speaker in reaching out, going out and talking about Parliament and politics in a non-party way is encouraging others to be interested in this subject. There is hunger out there. I say that I hope there is access to the new facilities because on one or two days of the week these days, it is quite difficult to get from Portcullis House to here in one piece. I do not want to discourage anybody from coming here, but we will have to look at that.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. May I just say to the right hon. Gentleman that I have taken careful note of his strictures on that point, and I regard it as being as close to a parliamentary instruction as he is minded to volunteer? I hope that he will not be disappointed when the eventual plans materialise.

[Mr Blunkett]

I am very grateful for that. These days, I grab at anything that indicates that what I have said is taken seriously, so thank you very much, Mr Speaker.

The way in which people see politics and Parliament has been raised. The allowances debacle four years ago is still doing great damage, partly because people believe things that do not happen and they believe and are worried about things that do happen. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Aberdeen South agrees when I say that, in relation to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, issues to do with disability matters have improved considerably. There is always a step back in any organisation when there is a change of personnel, because people do not know that others have been “educated” to understand the issues and to be sensitive to them. But when it comes to an understanding of families one would have thought that those who have families—everybody is brought up in some sort of family, even if they are looked after—would have understood the issues around family life. I regret that we have not got there yet.

On the issue of disability, access to elected office is important. I am pleased that 29 people have been fully funded on this. I have been trying to help people who have approached me from both major parties. No one has yet approached me from the Lib Dems, but I would not discriminate against them if they did, so perhaps I could encourage them to do so.

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend may be interested to know that there is not a single Lib Dem in the Chamber.

[Mr Blunkett]

I thought that the Equalities Minister was a Lib Dem.

[Nia Griffith]

She is absent.

[Mr Blunkett]

That is a shame because she served on the Speaker’s Conference. I was hoping that the enthusiasm that she showed five years ago would have shone through. I do know that ministerial office wears you down, and you sometimes lose the fervour that you came in with. Perhaps we could encourage her on these matters.

Access to elected office is important, but here is a thought.

[Julian Smith]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way on that point.

[Mr Blunkett]

Can I just do the thought? When you get to my age after 27 years in this place, if you do not deliver the thought when it is in your head, you might lose it.

The thought was how difficult it is for people with disabilities—it is equally true for those with caring responsibilities, who are mainly, although not exclusively, women—both to become a candidate in the European elections and then to campaign effectively across a region. We need to encourage the European Union to be a lot more supportive in that regard.

[Julian Smith]

On the point about the Liberal Democrat Minister who is not here. If I am not mistaken, she is on maternity leave. That is a really positive move, and crucial to the issues that we are debating.

[Mr Blunkett]

I have always been prepared to take advice from around me and behind me, and I totally commend the Minister on her drive and willingness to take on the difficult task of matching her political and personal responsibilities. How could I not? I am reliably informed that there is some sort of job share going on.

We must also not exaggerate the difficulties. We need to be positive in seeking change, but we need to tell people more often that it is possible to do it. I want to say something that is a bit more humble than usual. I am very proud to have been in the Cabinet for eight years, as I am of all sorts of things I have done over the past 44 years, both in local government and in Parliament, but probably the most important thing I have ever done, and the thing I am most proud of, is demonstrating to young people, families, employers and society in general that someone with a definable disability—I rarely talk about this—can work on equal terms in a very tough environment. If I can get that message across, everything else will have been worth while. I say that because I think that we have to be positive in saying, “Whatever your background, whatever the challenges you’ve had in life, whatever economic or physical disadvantages, and whatever your gender or race, you can do it.”

To pick up on the point made by the Chair of the Home Affairs Committee, I have often been concerned that particular ethnic minority groups are underrepresented in Parliament and in many areas of local government. I am particularly concerned in that regard about the Afro-Caribbean community. We need to look at how we can encourage particular groups to feel that they can play a part and that they would be welcome in doing so.

It is about people like us, but it is also about people who are changing like us. I want more people who have experienced challenges in their life to feel that they can come forward and use that experience to bring about positive change for others, but I also want them not to be daunted by the fact that we change. I am not the same person I was when I entered Sheffield city council in 1970, or even when I entered this place in 1987, and the challenges and difficulties I face are not the same. To begin with, I am better off now. I can buy things that I could not previously buy and do things that I could not previously do.

I am also slightly more daunted by things that I used to do, particularly when it comes to travel. For example—I will share this story with the House briefly—I remember going to a football match at Stamford Bridge when I was in my late teens. The match was between Sheffield Wednesday and Chelsea. I persuaded my mother that I would meet an old school friend, who was totally blind, at the ground. She was more terrified about it than I was, but I would be more terrified now than she was then. I came down on the coach and hooked on to the crowd going to Stamford Bridge. I got to the main gate and started shouted my friend’s name: “Tony.” He answered and I found him. How the hell I managed to find someone else who could not see outside the ground, I do not know.

The second part of that story is that we often rely on the support, encouragement and, sometimes, direct help of others, as we all need to be able to do. In those days football grounds did not have audio-described commentary, as they often do now, so we had to commandeer the poor devil who was fortuitously sitting behind us so that he could give us a commentary. Anyway, it was a one-all draw.

I think that this afternoon’s debate will also be a one-all draw, because I want to finish with a dangerous riposte to the hon. Member for Stourbridge, whose speech I enjoyed. She was very kind to my party in commending us on what we do. I must say that I wish we did it in quite the way she described. If we did, I think that I would be prouder, more encouraged and less concerned. We all have a great deal to do, within our political parties and within our society, to change the nature of how we describe our politics, what we are doing and the way in which we are seen and heard. Perhaps this biennial debate will help to encourage other people to think more positively, to be a little more courageous and, above all, to carry this forward post the general election next year.