International Women’s Day
Debate between Dave Robertson and Caroline Nokes(1 week, 1 day ago)
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Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)
Earlier, the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Kirsty Blackman) mentioned that it can be difficult to advise people to come into the role that we all do. She would be well served just by playing people a recording of what we have heard in the House today. This debate has been of the highest quality, and I thank everybody for their contributions so far. It has been a genuine pleasure to listen and be part of it.
We have had the whole gamut. People have taken the opportunity to big up their own constituencies. My hon. Friend the Member for South Derbyshire (Samantha Niblett) and the hon. Member for Spelthorne (Lincoln Jopp) did excellently. I will not mention everybody because I cannot remember everybody’s constituency, but I will do my best. People have taken the opportunity to celebrate wonderful things in the country, and the wonderful people who saw a glass ceiling and jumped higher. It has been wonderful to be part of it.
People also did not shy away from the difficult things that we must do. I thank the Liberal Democrat spokesperson, the hon. Member for North East Hampshire (Alex Brewer), as well as my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (John Grady), who both took the opportunity to talk about some really difficult things. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Dr Tidball) for her powerful testimony. She is somebody I always enjoy listening to in the Chamber, and I thank her for her contribution today.
The debate today serves many of those purposes. It gives us the opportunity to celebrate what is great, but also to talk about where our society and systems have failed women for far too long, and unfortunately, that is my role today. I want to raise a way in which the system has let down far too many people for far too long. I am talking about the crimes of Mohamed al-Fayed. I am specifically talking about his crimes, because I do not want to talk about him. Today is about the proud survivors who have done all they can to bring his crimes to light.
Al-Fayed, the former owner of Harrods, was a sexual predator. He trafficked and sexually abused hundreds of women over decades with near complete impunity. Well over 400 survivors have already come forward, and every day, more women take the brave decision to do so. Yesterday, the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) powerfully described al-Fayed as Britain’s Epstein. It is a characterisation that she and I have heard many times from survivors, as we co-chair the all-party parliamentary group for the survivors of Fayed and Harrods. It is good to see another of our officers here, the hon. Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam).
The scale of the crimes committed by this predator—I will not call him a man, because real men respect women—is staggering, but it is a mistake to think that this is the work of one bad human. Al-Fayed was supported by a network of enablers. He died having escaped justice, but there are scores of people who can and must be held to account. They include employees who identified, groomed and trafficked women for abuse; security staff who harassed and intimidated survivors into silence; lawyers who churned out non-disclosure agreement after non-disclosure agreement, while nobody thought to do anything about it; doctors who performed invasive medical exams and reported—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
Order. I apologise for interrupting the hon. Gentleman, but as there is one live civil case, may I encourage him to exercise caution in what he says? It is perfectly okay to say anything about Mr al-Fayed, who is dead.
Dave Robertson
Thank you for your guidance, Madam Deputy Speaker. That is really important, because there are some ongoing cases; I will talk about the Metropolitan police in a minute.
It is clear that we must do better. For far too long, survivors have been ignored. That cannot and must not continue. I am really grateful to the Minister for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls, who is set to meet survivors very soon, and I welcome the Prime Minister’s commitment yesterday to meeting survivors. It has taken far too long to get to this stage, but I am glad to see that things are finally starting to move.
I have had the privilege of meeting dozens of women who have taken the very brave step of disclosing their experiences to parliamentarians and people they have never met before. Their tenacity and strength has been fundamental to driving this agenda forward and making these recent advances. I am very grateful to all survivors, as I am sure everybody in the APPG is, but we must never take the trust that they have placed in us for granted.
The APPG ran a consultation with survivors, and we are really pleased that we have had dozens and dozens of responses to it, because we are clear that there is a huge network of people who have been wronged in so many ways by so many systems. It is astonishing how almost every time we have a meeting, there is something else. The scale of the failings cuts right across civil society and enormous parts of the state, and a huge amount needs to be done to recompense these people who have been so poorly served for so long.
I thank the Survivors Trust, which has been working with the APPG, and which provided invaluable support to ensure that we are working in a safe way, bearing in mind the trauma that survivors have suffered. In the coming months, I am eager to work with Members across this House and the other place, and anybody who wants to be involved, to make sure we build up a drumbeat of evidence about the scale of these crimes.
Access to Primary Healthcare
Debate between Dave Robertson and Caroline Nokes(1 year, 5 months ago)
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Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Newton Abbot (Martin Wrigley) on his excellent maiden speech. I am sure he will be a fierce advocate for the people of Newton Abbot and the surrounding area over the coming years. I look forward to working with him.
I am very glad to be able to speak in this debate, because primary care is an important issue that affects all our constituents. During the election campaign, it was absolutely the No. 1 issue that came up on the doorstep across Lichfield, Burntwood and the villages in my constituency.
We are effectively here to discuss the centralism and poor decision making that typified the last decade and a half of incompetence by the Conservative party on primary care. There can be fewer more obvious examples of that than the fate of Burntwood health and wellbeing centre in my constituency. The building was home to a GP surgery serving almost 5,000 residents in the town. The contract for the surgery expired in March last year, but no replacement facility was ready for that date. The surgery could not move, which meant it had to close. The building itself is still in use by the integrated care board and the practice was happy to seek an extension, but that was not allowed by NHS England.
As a result, more than one in eight people in the town have had to be redistributed to other surgeries because a process in London did not allow organisations in Staffordshire to deliver the best solution for my constituents. It is centralist and wrong. It was wrong then and it is wrong now, and it needs to change. Even worse still is that the proposed replacement facility, originally scheduled for completion in October 2023—last year—is nowhere near ready. We are expecting planning permission sometime in early 2025 and who knows when it will actually be completed.
This is such an important issue for my constituents in Burntwood, as we all know the potential knock-on effects that delays in accessing primary care can cause. The staff at the remaining surgeries are doing all they can to support the community, but at some point increased patient rolls like this cannot be mitigated. It is one example of the challenges people face in seeing a GP. It is not the only one in my constituency and very far from being the only one across the whole country. It cannot be fixed overnight; 14 years of it going wrong will take longer than 14 weeks to fix. However, I applaud the Health Secretary for going as far as he has so quickly: cutting red tape to allow 1,000 new GPs to be taken on and commissioning the Darzi review of the NHS so that this party, the one that created the NHS, can ensure that we build a health service that is fit for the 21st century.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for not using all his time. I call Tom Gordon to make his maiden speech.
Sir David Amess Adjournment Debate
Debate between Dave Robertson and Caroline Nokes(1 year, 6 months ago)
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Dave Robertson (Lichfield) (Lab)
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I thank hon. Members who have made their first speeches today for setting the bar so high? I hope I can live up to the standard that they have set.
I am sent to this place by the constituents of Lichfield, a constituency that includes not only the city itself, but the town of Burntwood and around 40 villages and hamlets in the great county of Staffordshire. I am proud to serve the area that has been my home since before I knew to call anywhere home and where I hope it will be for many, many more years to come.
My predecessor in this House was Sir Michael Fabricant. He was knighted in 2023 for political and public service after more than 30 years representing first the constituency of Mid Staffordshire and then Lichfield in this House. Thirty-two years in total Sir Michael served, and I think that would be a number to which we would all aspire. Should I be fortunate enough to still be in this place in 30 years’ time, Madame Deputy Speaker, I can only hope to have such a head of hair.
It is, however, to longevity that I wish to turn now. Although I have received advice from some colleagues not to mention the Domesday Book, I can neatly sidestep that as the recorded history of my constituency dates back some 1,000 years before William the Conqueror to the Roman invasion and the establishment of Letocetum, a Roman fort and later settlement near the crossroads of Watling Street and Rykneld Street in my constituency. The crossing of those two roads remained an important place throughout the Roman and Saxon periods, and, in the 7th century, Chad of Mercia established a cathedral and diocese in Lichfield, which still exists today. In just over a week’s time, I will be proud to be in attendance at the installation of—I think—the 58th dean of Lichfield cathedral. The Right Reverend Jan MacFarlane will be the first woman to hold that post and will not only smash a glass ceiling, but be an excellent advocate for the cathedral and the Church in the local community and beyond.
The 7th century is also noteworthy for the burying of the Staffordshire hoard, which was uncovered in Hammerwich in my constituency in 2009, near that same crossroads of Watling Street and Rykneld Street. The largest collection of Anglo-Saxon gold ever found, the hoard is already having, and will continue to have, a significant impact on our understanding of the people of these isles, before there was an England, a Scotland, a Wales or a Northern Ireland.
Let me move on from the 7th century. Over the coming years, the city would continue to flourish and establish itself as a religious and ecumenical centre, although much of the surrounding area maintained its rural and agrarian aspect for many centuries to come. In this time, the area did produce innumerable great lives, and, while they are far too numerous to mention all of them here, I should note Gregory King, the world’s first economic statistician; Elias Ashmole, whose collections founded the Ashmolean museum, the first of its type in the UK; David Garrick, the noted theatre innovator and manager; the physician Erasmus Darwin, a founding member of the Lunar Society who had a rather famous grandson; the poet, Anna Seward; Thomas Gisborne of Yoxall Lodge, an abolitionist and a close associate of William Wilberforce; the painter John Louis Petit, who is having a wonderful renaissance in the understanding of his work; Frederick Oakeley, who translated the words to “O Come All Ye Faithful” in Lichfield cathedral; and, of course, Samuel Johnson, a man of letters and the author of the first dictionary of the English language.
Johnson’s heir, Samuel Barber, was a freed slave who would go on to run a school in Burntwood, decades before Tom Jenkins would begin teaching in Teviothead in Scotland, and who would also serve as a dozener in local government in Lichfield and almost certainly become the first black man to serve in local government in the UK.
Before I move on from some famous people from around the area, I should mention a local success story in Sophie Capewell. Lichfield’s golden girl brought home not just a gold medal from Paris this year, but a world record as part of Team GBs fantastic efforts. In doing so, she ended my reign as the most successful former pupil of my old school, Nether Stowe in Lichfield, and although I had hoped to hold that title a little longer than 32 days I am happy to be disappointed on that point.
Returning to my historical tour of Lichfield and its surrounding area, we reach the early and mid-19th century, and the town of Burntwood, a conurbation of mining villages, which grew up some four miles from Lichfield and has a similarly proud history. Its most notable resident was the fundraiser and campaigner Stephen Sutton, who raised millions for the Teenage Cancer Trust despite his diagnosis. We lost him far too soon, at the age of just 19. He was made an MBE for his fundraising, so it is more than fitting that Burntwood town council remembers him through a student award named in his honour.
Not to be outshone by the cathedral down the road, Burntwood also took its place in ecclesiastical history when, in 1883, St Anne’s church in Chasetown became the first in the country to have electric lighting. Today, the people of Burntwood still maintain a close-knit community, typical of former mining areas. That is shown by the great examples of the Spark café and Burntwood Be a Friend, which have done so much to step in to replace services cut during 14 long years of Conservative Government. If we are discussing Burntwood, we cannot forget the giant-killing exploits of Chasetown FC in the FA cup of 2007-08. At some point, I will forgive the Members for Cardiff.
Burntwood is not the only part of my constituency that has a mining history. The village of Handsacre also more than played its part in powering the industry of the 19th and 20th centuries. It is also the village where my old man taught his first lessons as a probationary teacher in the 1970s. The suggestion that his Geordie accident was in part responsible for his hiring in a school built to teach the children of new arrivals from the north-east remains suspected, if unconfirmed.
Mining was not the only industry that found its way to my part of Staffordshire. Many of us will recognise the name Armitage Shanks, but few will know its links to the village of Armitage, just a short trip up Rugeley Road from Handsacre. As the new Government focus their legislative agenda on growth, I remind colleagues that while many of us may have already spent a penny with Armitage Shanks, they are all welcome to visit and spend many more in the coming years.
All this industry meant that the canals came to my constituency. The Coventry canal and the Trent and Mersey canal are still navigable today, and the work of the Lichfield and Hatherton Canal Restoration Trust should be commended, as it aims to restore that link as a green and blue way over the coming years.
Having touched again on transport, I will complete the circle and return to the crossroads that made Letocetum. Watling Street, or the A5, as it is now known, and Rykneld Street, the A38, are major transport arteries that link my constituency together, and link it easily to the rest of the country. The A38 in particular has helped to establish a logistics centre in the village of Fradley on the site of the former RAF Lichfield. Fans of the BBC’s “Bargain Hunt” will know Fradley well, given the regular appearances of Richard Winterton and his auctioneers on that show. I hope that I can get as much airtime as they do.
Slightly further up the A38 is the National Memorial Arboretum near Alrewas—a wonderful venue, as the site of national remembrance. I advise every single person to make a visit there to remember, not just in November but on any day. I am sure that in the coming months the Secretary of State for Transport will grow tired of my lobbying about the need for a railway station to serve that amazing location. On a dissimilar note, the first Travelodge in the UK was opened slightly up the road some 39 years ago, near the village of Barton-under-Needwood, although that village should be much better remembered as the home of the Holland tug of war team. Founded in 1970, the team has represented England at numerous international tournaments, and even brought home a silver medal from the 2010 world open championships.
It is to this constituency that I will return during the recess. I look forward to speaking to my constituents about transport, access to healthcare, education, health and care plans, and many other issues that are on their lips. I look forward to bringing those stories back to this place, so that I can continue to advocate on my constituents’ behalf.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)
I call Edward Morello to make his maiden speech.