MPs’ Round-Up

MPs’ round-up We’re nearly free! Time for extra mental health help

The 21st of June is now dangling tantalisingly before us – a date on which we’ll regain those freedoms which we’ve been forced to abnegate for too long. And in the weeks leading up to that date – and in the months beyond, we’ll see an exponential explosion of growth – physical infrastructure mushrooming, businesses expanding and offices reopening. Goethe once described architecture as ‘frozen music’. And even as we’ll see the aptness of that comparison in the world around us, I’m conscious that there are hidden, unseen problems that have been created or exacerbated by the enormously testing times through which we’ve all lived. Having had the privilege to help literally thousands of constituents across the course of the pandemic, I know that mental health will have to be a real priority for the post-covid agenda. So it’s about our internal architecture, too, unthawing the internal freeze so many have felt during this period and ensuring that they can find responsive chords in the world around them. I know from my conversations and correspondence that many in our area have suffered acutely from loneliness, a sense of despair and the appalling emotional wrench of compelled separation from family and friends. And this seems an appropriate time to ensure that physical and mental health finally enjoy parity of esteem. The Government have pledged an additional £2.3 billion for mental health services by 2023-24 – an increased share of the NHS budget – to ensure that the silent suffering we’ve seen can find relief. And it’s worth saying this is not merely a problem that results from economic hardship, but also hits our young people – those who haven’t been able to see their teachers and friends for months and others whose ambitions have stalled as a result of exam cancellations or fewer employment opportunities. So we’re also going to see a further £1.4 billion to improve accessibility and availability of mental health support for young people. If the aim of building back better is to be realised then it’s about doing so in a holistic sense – ensuring our mental, physical and economic resilience is strengthened. That’s what I’ll be attempting to achieve and support in the weeks and months ahead.

Somerton & Frome MP David Warburton

Tide is turning in incinerators argument

Back in December, I wrote about proposals for an energy-from-waste (EfW) incinerator in my constituency. In that piece, I wrote: ‘We still have a lot to do in terms of our emissions reductions in Wiltshire, the south west and nationally. Wiltshire Council declared a climate emergency in 2019; Westbury has an Air Quality Management Area; the U.K. is en route to a carbon neutral future and is hosting COP26 next year. More incinerators contradict these policies and ambitions.’ Well, the campaign against Northacre Renewable Energy’s (NRE) incinerator continues with renewed emphasis on these points. This week, we had the first session of COP26 oral parliamentary questions to government ministers - the President, Alok Sharma MP, and Minister Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP. I was squeezed into proceedings on Wednesday just before PMQs, when I had the opportunity to ask whether the Glasgow summit later this year will provide an opportunity to debate the question of our burning waste. I believe that in this COP presidency year we should be doing nothing that will encourage old-style incinerators that pump effluent into the great landfill in the sky in places like Westbury. Part of Minister Trevelyan’s response was: “The work that we have done already in the Resources and Waste Strategy is leading the way and we are looking to eliminate all avoidable waste by 2050.” The Strategy in question outlines plans to create greater efficiency from EfW and ensure that ‘all future EfW plants achieve recovery status’. A second strategy –cited earlier in proceedings by Alok Sharma – is the PM’s Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution. Under this, the government sets out plans to increase energy from low carbon hydrogen. NRE’s proposals for a moving grate old-style incinerator fall well short of being efficient, a recovery facility, or low carbon hydrogen fuelled – as the government’s strategy rightly demands. Indeed, NRE already has permission for a gasification plant at Westbury based on cleaner technology. It seems the tide is turning, however. My comments came just days after Minister Kwasi Kwarteng refused permission for a 390,00 tonne EfW facility in North Kent. The decision for the Westbury incinerator is currently in the hands of the Environment Agency and Wiltshire Council – both of whom have now closed their consultations. Hopefully they will prevent its construction, and with it the need for the Secretary of State to be called upon to rule on this proposal.

MP for South West Wiltshire Dr Andrew Murrison

MPs’ round-up School staff have been phenomenal

So! The sensible and steady path from lockdown to more normal times will soon be opened and we will all begin to take our tentative steps forward. The Prime Minister is right to tailor future moves based on solid data rather than arbitrary dates. Coronavirus is an atheist virus. It did not recognise Christmas and has no intention of changing its habit for Easter. Baby steps rather than a buccaneer’s stride are what is needed and that is what I shall support. I am delighted that it will be our schools who will benefit from the reduction in the R rate, the wonderfully high numbers of those being vaccinated and the fear of the NHS being swamped abating. But when we say ‘schools will reopen from the 8th March’ people think school gates closed for Christmas and will only be unlocked in the early spring sunshine. Our schools have never fully shut. As the parent of three school-aged children (1 at Gillingham High and 2 at St Gregory’s Primary in Marnhull) I have seen at first hand the challenge that teachers have overcome. Schools have stayed open to ensure education is provided to some of our most vulnerable children and to those of key workers, allowing them to carry on their key work, for which we are all so grateful. We have seen teachers perform an impressive balancing act in delivering both in-class and athome learning. The qualitative step change in the latter since lockdown 1 has been amazing. The High School has even delivered a parents’ evening which was slightly akin to speed dating (so I am told having never sped-dated) but it worked. Teachers, heads and governors have kept the ship afloat, preparing and delivering lessons for two parallel universes; receiving completed work both physically, via Teams or email. Responding to pupils’ questions in real time through a virtually raised yellow hand or keeping a weather eye on the chat bar. Multi-tasking par excellence. Having been involved with helping to administer the lateral flow tests at Gillingham, Shaftesbury and Blandford high schools I have seen those teachers and pupils in school on a daily basis. They are not reopening; they have never closed. I fervently hope that this approach means that we have reduced the risk of losing a generation. Having discussed with heads their plans I am hugely encouraged they are alert to the needs of being hands-on and alert to identify and support those who found home learning hard. They have monitored them over the weeks. I know that they won’t leave anyone behind. The support staff who keep the schools clean and covid secure are the unsung heroes. Invidious I know to name check but the work I’ve seen people like Rachel and Tina do in Gillingham, keeping the school clean and the testing hall spick and span, is so important. To all the Rachels and Tinas in our schools, again, I say ‘thank you’. To those staff who, with little notice, set up testing centres, and their colleagues who mucked in the heartfelt thanks of parents across North Dorset. Our local schools are phenomenal places of learning and development. I’ve always believed (having toyed with being one myself) that teaching is a vocation not a career. We have seen the very best these last months and I know we will continue to see it. I fervently hope that society will now see our teachers in a new and respectful light. They are the potters and sculptors helping to create and shape our next generation. Their work is of the utmost importance. I salute and thank them all.

MP for North Dorset Simon Hoare

A bit cautious maybe, but welcome news

A couple of weeks ago, I visited one of our vaccination centres in Dorchester to see first-hand the hard work that our healthcare staff and volunteers are doing at the Atrium Centre. At the time of writing, our vaccination program continues to deliver the highest vaccination rates in Europe. It was just over a year ago that the Chief Medical Officer asked me to attend a briefing with him in Parliament about a new Coronavirus. The following week I met him in Downing Street and a month later we were in a lockdown. Eleven months after that day, on Monday last week, the Prime Minister set out a roadmap to release us more quickly, but with the South African variant continuing to be a concern, the Government doesn’t believe that the risk can be taken. The plan gives us the brightest light at the end of the tunnel we have had for the past year. Here in Dorset, 15% of people work in the tourism sector. It has been a tough year, but we can now look forward to 12th April when the Prime Minister’s roadmap will bring renewal to the hundreds of pubs, restaurants, cafes, hotels and tourist attractions across West Dorset and the wider area, setting the path to sunnier skies and greener pastures with the safe re-opening of hospitality and

MP for West Dorset Chris Loder

finally get out of these national restrictions. The plan is cautious. If I’m honest, a bit too cautious for my personal preference and I was hopeful that the hard work to get us into Tier 1 at the end of 2020 would visitor economy. In normal times, 685,000 overnight trips are made to West Dorset each year, along with five million day trips! Last week, I joined a number of online meetings about the Dorset Local Plan. It is becoming clearer to me that the Dorset National Park proposal is now influencing the proposal to have developments of thousands of houses forced upon Dorchester and Gillingham and Sherborne as they lie outside the proposed National Park area, meaning we absorb the quota being in the authority area, but outside the National Park. It strengthens my view that we should not have a National Park for Dorset.