February 3 2014

One of those standard lines used by MPS of all parties is 'my postbag is full of messages expressing concerns about.....' or some variation on it. Nowadays of course we should say inbox rather than postbag because it is now relatively rare for a constituent to actually write to their MP but email means that many more to let their Westminster representative what they think about a whole variety of subjects. But how representative are they?

‎If I were to hear from just one per cent of my constituents on any one subject it would mean receiving about 700 messages and though it sometimes feels like that many in truth I have never received anything like that number and only one subject has passed 100. Was it a perceived threat to the NHS, possible military action in Libya or Syria, increased tuition fees, pensions, education? No actually it was what was portrayed as privatisation of forests. 

Usually, of course, it is people opposed to something that contact their MP. ‎A couple of weeks ago someone emailed to ask how many people had contacted me about the Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill of which I suspect few readers will have heard, actually it's been quite a few, but when I replied saying 43 he seemed shocked. Anyway the Bill this week received the Royal Assent.

The big set-piece parliamentary event of the week has certainly been the Immigration Bill which will go a long way to tightening up the law with respect to all aspects of immigration including rights of appeal, access to benefits and services and the regulation of sham marriages.

I was one of 97 Conservatives who voted to strengthen even more the rules governing deportation of foreign criminals which Labour and the LibDems voted against. Even more surprisingly they voted against the whole Bill.

This came less than a week after they joined forces in the House of Lords in an attempt to wreck the Bill seeking to put into law that there must be an in/out European referendum before the end of 2017. The irony of the unelected House of Lords trying to prevent the British people from going to the polling station is disgraceful.

The common theme running through the debates over the Immigration Bill and the Referendum Bill is that Labour and the LibDems are on the wrong side of public opinion. These are two of the issues that, apart from the economy, are the ones that most people want to talk about on the doorstep or at my street or supermarket surgeries.

I can’t for the life of me see why Labour should want to place themselves in this so obviously out-of-touch position. To have an unelected House of Lords out of touch with public opinion is one thing but to have the Official Opposition in that position is very surprising.

The really good news of this last week were the latest growth figures; there can now be no doubt that the recovery is well under way. Of course it will take time to filter down but we are heading for better times and I’m delighted that the recent debate about a possible increase in the minimum wage clearly shows that the Government intend to ensure that the lower=paid are among the first to benefit.