Valedictory Debate

Justine Greening Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Patrick McLoughlin]

I am very grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. I think, with the problems we inherited, that there was a lot the coalition Government did of which we can rightly be proud.

I was Chief Whip for a considerable time, and I have to say that I was greatly assisted at the time by two people in the Whips Office to whom I want to refer—Sir Roy Stone and Mark Kelly. Roy Stone is basically the usual channels, as you well know, Madam Deputy Speaker. It is true that there have been only four people to hold the position of principal private secretary to the Chief Whip in the last 100 years, and Roy himself has been doing it since November 2000. The House, the Government and the Opposition have a great servant in Roy, and I really want to say a big thank you to him for the work he does. I think he would say that there is never a dull moment in what he does.

I would like to say a few things about the Whips Office, which I think is quite often misunderstood both inside and outside this place. Contrary to some of the wilder stories, it is the personnel department of any parliamentary party, dealing with a wide range of issues both personal and political.

[Justine Greening (Putney) (Ind)]

In my experience, I always saw the Whips Office as a human resources department, but with the “human” bit taken out.

[Sir Patrick McLoughlin]

Well, everybody is allowed to have their views. All I can say to my right hon. Friend is that she ought to have to deal with some of the people the Whips Office has to deal with.

I would like to say something to all people who come into this House of Commons. Whatever they think about the Whips Office and about the party system, very few people would get into this House on their own ability; they get here only because they belong to a major political party or a political party, and I think that is sometimes forgotten by them when they get here.

In 2012, David Cameron gave me the option of becoming Secretary of State for Transport. As Chief Whip, I was aware of the offer just a little time in advance of the reshuffle, so I had time to reflect on it. It was a big step to move from the back office of politics to the front office, or to the frontline, as it so often seemed, particularly in those first few weeks at the Department for Transport, where I had of course started as a junior Minister some time before.

I remember very well, Madam Deputy Speaker, you coming to me on that Monday afternoon, when I knew what was going to happen to me, and you told me that the Opposition day debate on Wednesday was going to be on rail fares. I did try to say to you that I did not think this was a very good idea and could you not find a different subject to take on. The next morning you realised why I might have suggested that, but as usual you stuck to your guns, and I found myself responding to such a debate that week.

I found my four years at the Department for Transport one of the most fascinating periods that I spent in government, and it was a huge privilege to be the Secretary of State and head of a major Department such as that.

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[Justine Greening (Putney) (Ind)]

As long as nobody heckles me, I am sure I will absolutely be able to stay to time.

I want to start by saying a massive thank you to, first of all, my office team, who are up in the Gallery. They have done an absolutely incredible job for so many Members here over many, many years. I have to point out particularly the long-suffering Kate and Nikki. Without their assistance and support and that of the rest of the team that I have got with me today, I would never have been able to do any of the rest of the things that I have been able to achieve for my community in this place.

Other Members have explained what it was like for them when they first entered the House. For me in 2005, winning back Putney from the Labour party was quite big news, and I found myself in the middle of a media storm from minute one of my time as an MP.

Michael Howard came down the next day to, as I thought, congratulate the brilliant team at Putney Conservatives who had helped me with that amazing victory. I stayed up all night organising his visit as the great leader, and he promptly turned up and resigned right by my side. Perhaps the best legacy from the few months that he had left in his role in 2005 was that he got back together a parliamentary party that had been in opposition for quite some time. He had us talk through different policy areas, and we discovered that, other than arguing about Europe, we had much more in common than that which divided us.

My time in this House has obviously been the greatest privilege of my life. I did not plan to be an MP, but I did it because I think people matter. I hope that I have always been a strong voice for people in Putney on the issues they care about, and I have simply sought to take their priorities and make them mine. My campaigning on Heathrow was perhaps an early indicator to the Whips and my party that I would stand my ground on local issues that matter to my community. I started my time here doing that, and I like to think that I have finished my time here doing that not only on Brexit, on which speaking up for local communities is crucial, but on a whole range of other issues, such as air pollution, quality of life, aircraft noise, and improving our transport. We were able to modernise Putney station and get improvements to Southfields station, and the lifts at both stations now mean that the whole public can access local public transport. I am particularly proud of those things, and I was on the case for getting a lift at East Putney station, and I very much hope that my successor will do the same.

I tirelessly campaigned on serious issues such as youth crime and policing. In fact, my very first Westminster Hall debate was on youth and youth crime, but I am sorry to say that things have not moved on as much as perhaps they should have done in the intervening 14 years, and this House still debates the very issues that I was debating as an incoming MP.

I want to reflect on the hugely important role that community groups and residents associations have played in my local community. Brilliant charities such as Regenerate, which works on the Alton estate in Roehampton, play an amazing role in inspiring young people to make more of their lives. There is the brilliant Putney Society—the ultimate residents association in Putney—and then, of course, there are incredible residents associations in Southfields, such as Southfields Grid, Southfields Triangle, and Sutherland Grove Conservation Area. All those organisations bring our community together and make it what it is, and I am so proud and delighted that I have been able to work with them for so many years.

I have had probably more roles than most in this House. I started my time in government in the Treasury team with the then MP for Tatton, George Osborne, carrying out an emergency Budget to ensure that this country’s finances did not go the way of Greece’s, and I have reflected on that as we have debated what a no-deal Brexit might mean for us. I quickly discovered as a Minister that I had the ability to make a difference way beyond even perhaps what people might have thought my brief was, so I got stuck into looking at the tolls on the Humber bridge, and I was delighted that I was able to get them reduced. I ended up with a beer temporarily named after me in that part of the country, and that meant a lot to me because I watched the Humber bridge open as I grew up. I was delighted to be able to make a change that meant that it can be a successful piece of infrastructure that joins two wonderful communities, rather than dividing them.

From there I moved on to the Department for Transport, where I had to make sure that transport enabled the 2012 Olympics and did not get in the way of them being the triumph they were. I worked with the then Mayor of London, who went on to do other things, including becoming Prime Minister. I am proud of that work, because hopefully we made the Olympics accessible to millions of people who did not have to worry about being suddenly stranded.

From there my journey took me to the Department for International Development, which often operates out of the sight of our country. I could not be more proud of the truly world-class team in the Department. We worked hand in hand with the Ministry of Defence on Ebola, and we did pioneering work to bring education to children caught up by the terrible crisis in Syria. We took a decision in DFID that we would do our level best to make sure those children grew up educated and able to read and write. So much of the Department’s work happens out of sight of the British public, but the British public should be rightly proud of that work, which stretches beyond that to girls’ education and responding to humanitarian emergencies such as Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines. I am truly honoured to have had so much time in that Department.

After that, my final Cabinet role was perhaps my dream role: Secretary of State for Education and—perfect—Minister for Women and Equalities. I was the first LGBT woman in Cabinet and, of course, the first Secretary of State for Education to be educated at their local comprehensive school, and I am only too happy to have those two firsts and to have put something back into a school system that built me into being able to do anything with my life and to achieve what I have achieved.

It was brilliant to be able to work with the most inspiring teachers I could have ever hoped to meet. It is a fantastic profession, and I would say to anyone who is thinking about what to do to make a difference with their life that they should go into teaching, because that is where they can shape the future. It was a privilege to be able to work with people in that profession, and it is one of the reasons why I focused so much on their continued professional development.

[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

I am very concerned and upset about my right hon. Friend’s departure, not least because somebody else will have to bring the jelly babies for us at Prime Minister’s Question Time. She has spoken at length about her extraordinary contribution to this House and to her community, but she has not yet mentioned one of her greatest legacies and interests, which I know she will continue outside this House, and that is her complete and utter obsession with social mobility. We all desperately want more to happen on that score in this country.

[Justine Greening]

My hon. Friend is quite right, and he brings me on to why I am here today as a Member who is departing the House. I have served my community and my country in Parliament for 14 years, but the mission that drives me more than any other is social mobility. It has characterised my life, and it is crucial to the future of our country and to making it a country in which there is equality of opportunity so that everybody gets the chance, and indeed the right, to use their talents. Part of the solution to delivering that is in government and in Parliament, of course, but the other part of the solution is surely outside this place. Working with businesses and organisations is part of how we will get opportunities to more young people. Through the social mobility pledge, I will be continuing to work on social mobility and, indeed, scaling it up.

When I look to the horizon and where our country’s journey is going next, I recognise, understand and agree that this House will rightly remain obsessed with Brexit, but there will be a time after that. I want to make a constructive and positive contribution to social mobility, and I want to make sure that, when we get to that point, I am able to show that businesses are part of the solution for getting more opportunities to more young people. We must reflect on that and build on it further.