Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill

Anna Dixon Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 29th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Anna Dixon (Shipley) (Lab)]

I congratulate you, Madam Deputy Speaker, on your election and I welcome you to your place. I commend my many hon. Friends who have made such tremendous contributions in the House this evening, particularly my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee), who gave a moving tribute to his parents, and my young hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Connor Naismith), who has a few less grey hairs than me.

I also congratulate my right hon. Friend the Transport Secretary; it is wonderful to see her in her place on the Government Benches. I thank her and her team for bringing the Bill to the House so quickly.

I am honoured to have been elected by the people of Shipley constituency to represent them. I grew up on the edge of the moors in beautiful Wharfedale, and I am proud to serve the place I now call home. I am by no means the youngest Member to have represented the seat—that honour goes to Chris Leslie who, at 24, was the baby of the House when he was elected in 1997—but I am the first woman. I am delighted to be part of the most diverse Parliament with some 263 women MPs on both sides of the House.

On my first day, as I emerged from Westminster tube and looked up in awe at the Palace of Westminster, I took a diversion across Parliament Square to pay homage to Millicent Fawcett, the social campaigner and suffragist whose statue stands alongside Churchill and Gandhi. She holds a banner with the motto, “Courage calls to courage everywhere”. I have carried those words with me during my first few weeks in Parliament, although I feel more like the lion from “The Wizard of Oz” as I stand here to make my maiden speech—please, give me courage.

I know the people of Shipley have put their trust in me, however, which gives me heart. All around me, I see people of courage—every one of us on these Benches. First, we had the courage to stand in the hostile climate in which politics has been conducted recently. It is vital that our democracy is not undermined by those who wish to abuse, threaten and intimidate. I am grateful to the Labour Women’s Network for giving me the support and encouragement to stand, as well as to my husband David, who is here today. I am proud to support 50:50 Parliament’s campaign, Ask Her To Stand, and I thank the Jo Cox Foundation for its work to promote civility in politics. I will play my part in upholding standards in this place.

Secondly, we have the courage to stand up for what we believe in. Each one of us has come to this place with a passion to change things for the better and to leave our communities and the country a better place than when we arrived. I am heartened by the commitment to work across this House and put aside tribal politics where they get in the way of progress and bring the common good to the fore. I look forward to working with my neighbour, the right hon. Member—no, not quite—the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) [Interruption.] Not yet. I will seek to work with colleagues who share my passion to ensure all disabled and older people get access to the care and support they need to live a full life, work I started as the chair of the archbishops’ commission on reimagining care and which I hope to see delivered in the form of a national care service under this Labour Government.

Finally, we must also have the courage to speak up for those whose voices are rarely heard in the corridors of power, to tell their stories, to demand changes that will improve their lives and to show how things can be better. Many years ago, my teacher Mr Hodgson told me, “You can spend your life shouting from the outside or go and change things from the inside.” I intend to use my voice in this place to speak up for the people of Shipley constituency, particularly those whose voice is too often ignored or drowned out.

So I am proud that we have a Government who are courageous and have wasted no time in pressing forward with ambitious legislation to deliver on their promises, and today my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport has set out another bold plan, taking the first steps to establish Great British Railways. The people of Shipley constituency have suffered from expensive and unreliable public transport for too long. Today’s Bill will begin the work of putting the “public” back into public transport, delivering better connectivity so that children from Baildon and Burley-in-Wharfedale can get to school, commuters from Cottingley, Crossflatts and Cullingworth can get to work, and pensioners from Eldwick and Gilstead can get to the shops—boosting the economy, enabling tourists to visit our wonderful heritage and beautiful countryside in Bingley and Shipley, and making it easier for people to enjoy a night out in Bradford, proudly the city of culture in 2025.

According to protocol, I am to say something about my immediate predecessor, Sir Philip Davies, who served the people of Shipley constituency for 19 years. He was always diligent about his correspondence, replying quickly to constituents. Sir Philip advocated for investment in the local area, and it is in part thanks to his efforts that the NHS has recently committed to reinvesting funds from the sale of Shipley hospital into a new health and wellbeing hub. I look forward to continuing his work to bring a hoped-for boost to Shipley town centre. I can, however, reassure the House that I do not intend to continue his tradition of filibustering on a Friday.

I also wish to pay tribute to other Members who have sat on these Benches and inspired me. There was the formidable Yorkshirewoman Betty Boothroyd, the first woman Speaker of the House. Her courage gave a teenage lass from Ilkley the idea that she might one day follow in her footsteps, so I hope I can in time make my own contribution to the work of this House.

Jo Cox was a contemporary of mine at Cambridge, and it was her life and horrific murder that spurred me on to stand. On reading her biography in 2017, I wrote in my own diary:

“The values she sought to reflect in the MP she was are also ones I aspire to: to be brave, principled, focused, respected, grounded.”

These values will be the yardstick against which I will judge my own time in this place.

It is usual to say something about the constituency I represent, and there is much to celebrate in the Shipley constituency from Wilsden to Windhill, Micklethwaite to Menston. We are home to the highest flight of locks on the canals in Britain and the original setting for TV soap “Emmerdale”.

However, I am going to focus on one place, Saltaire, a model village built by Sir Titus Salt, a philanthropist and mill owner. The mill was at the forefront of innovation in the wool trade and the largest in Europe. Salt provided decent housing and amenities for the workers, a library, a school—now home to Shipley college—and a church. He was wary of the demon drink, though, so no pub, although I am pleased to say that Saltaire now boasts an excellent brewery. Salt understood that economic growth and lifting people out of poverty go hand in hand, and I am proud that the Labour Government will ensure there are high-quality jobs for local people, end the trap of low-paid work and open up opportunities for people to train for the jobs of the future.

I could tell hon. Members about other inspiring historical figures who hail from or have lived in my constituency and are immortalised in the names of local buildings and roads, or I could tell them about the many amazing volunteers who keep our communities blooming, the independent business owners whose industry powers our local economy and the local farmers whose toil puts food on our plates, but I would like to tell them about those in my own life whose courage has given me courage.

My great-grandfather Frederick Dixon fought and died on Flanders fields in the first world war. My grandfather Herbert, true to his Christian beliefs, refused to serve in the military during the second world war and undertook other vital work. He died in a car accident that left my grandmother Freda in a coma with brain injuries. She learned to walk again, to feed herself and to write with her left hand. She lived for another 30 years, albeit with disability and mainly housebound, but she could still beat all of us at Scrabble.

My late uncle David came to this country from Zambia on a scholarship and became the first black African to play golf for Oxford University—a golf legend 40 years before Tiger Woods hit the headlines. My niece Martha, diagnosed as autistic after struggling with mental health issues as a teenager, has had the courage to embrace her difference and find her way in the world.

My family—in particular my mum and dad, who are in the Gallery—and my church taught me the values that I bring to my politics: that everyone should be able to live free from prejudice and discrimination, and that those of us who have plenty must share what we have and take action to lift people out of poverty and tackle inequalities. I am proud to be a member of the Labour party, which is putting those values into practice.

There will be time in the coming months for me to talk about the priorities that I will deliver for the people of Shipley—getting local GP and NHS dental services back for patients in places like Wrose, stopping sewage dumping in the Wharfe and the Aire, having more neighbourhood police in villages such as Denholme and Harden, revitalising our high streets in Shipley and Bingley and supporting young people’s mental health—but the final issue that I would like to highlight today is the contribution of family carers.

My mum cared for my grandma for many years, and it was her love and support that enabled my grandma to go to church, take trips up the dales, see friends and family and have a good life. There are millions of unsung heroes like her, unpaid and undervalued. Behind closed doors across this country, an estimated 5 million people—mostly women—are providing support and care to loved ones. I want to make them my priority in this place, and I will start by campaigning for a review of the carer’s allowance to ensure that hard-pressed carers are not penalised for taking a part-time job to make ends meet.

I would like to end where I began: with the words of Millicent Fawcett ringing in my ears. Courage calls to courage everywhere. I will stand up for what I believe in and speak up for the people of Shipley constituency, and perhaps my courage will inspire another young Yorkshire lass to follow me into this place one day. As Betty would have said, time’s up.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Ghani)]

Jo Cox and David Amess are never far from our thoughts.

Front Benchers will be called to speak at about 9.30 pm, and we have three Back Benchers left to speak, so please be mindful of time. I call Catherine Atkinson.