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Health and Education

Madam Deputy Speaker, I am delighted to make my maiden speech to the House on a debate about education and health—two key issues for my constituency. First, however, I want to congratulate new hon. Members on their maiden speeches today. I greatly enjoyed hearing the speeches over the last few hours and we have ranged from Swansea, East to Dundee, West and Brent, South, which has been a real education. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for South-West Surrey (Mr. Hunt), who provided an interesting tour of his constituency and spoke with authority on education both here and abroad. I wish him every success in his parliamentary career. My constituency of Kingston upon Hull, North is situated in a proud and famous city, which continues to play an important role in the political life of the nation. I want to commence by paying tribute to my predecessor, Kevin McNamara, and then to explain a little of Hull’s history and what is happening there today. Kevin first entered Parliament as the MP for Hull, North in the famous and hard-fought by-election of January 1966. At that stage, Harold Wilson had a majority of just three MPs, which puts Labour’s majority of 67 on 5 May this year in its proper context. Kevin’s victory in the by-election convinced Harold Wilson that he should go to the country just a few months later—and the rest, as they say, is history, when a Labour Government was returned with a much increased majority. One of my constituents, Mrs. Jean Oxley, who worked tirelessly for Kevin in the by-election, even wrote to Harold Wilson, saying that Labour supporters were quite exhausted after the campaign and asking whether he could bear that in mind in thinking about calling a general election. It is to be noted that Jean, though exhausted in 1966, is still going strong, and at the age of 94 she nominated me as the Labour candidate in the general election. Kevin served the area for the next 39 years. In campaigning with Kevin in recent months, I was struck by the warmth and fondness that local people felt for their MP. In Yorkshire, of course, we do not have the displays of emotion that we saw on the streets of Brent, South, but I was gesticulated at on many occasions, as was my colleague in Sheffield, the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr. Clegg). Kevin is a man proud of his Catholic faith and he has strong principles and values, which he never shied away from voicing. Members will be aware that Kevin served as Labour’s principal spokesperson for Northern Ireland—a cause dear to his heart—between 1987 and 1994. He held many other roles, including Opposition spokesperson for defence and the civil service. In recent years, he has been a member of the Council of Europe and a key member of the Joint Committee on Human Rights. Kevin took a passionate interest in human rights, championing the rights of groups, including travellers and the young soldiers who died at Deepcut, which society often wants to ignore or forget. Kevin was always a strong advocate of animal welfare, and I am pleased that before he retired, fox hunting was finally legislated against. Kevin is quoted as describing his most important work as an MP as putting"““the final nail in the coffin of capital punishment by moving the amendment to include protocol 6 (which prohibits the death penalty) to the Human Rights Bill.””" I am sure that the House will join me in wishing Kevin and his wife, Nora, a healthy and happy retirement. I move on now to deal with Kingston upon Hull and its fascinating place in the political, constitutional and social history of this country. When people drive into Hull, they are greeted by a sign stating that Hull is a pioneering city: if we consider its history, we realise why. First, in 1642, Hull slammed the gate shut in the face of King Charles who was trying to access arms held in the city—an action that preserved the political liberties, rights and privileges of this House against the monarchy. Secondly, Hull is the birthplace of William Wilberforce, who was born in 1759, later became an MP for the city and fought to abolish slavery. The cry of the abolitionists—““Am I not a man and a brother?””—still resonates today as we see slavery, people trafficking and especially women trafficked for sex still continuing around the world. In 2007, we will celebrate the 200th anniversary of the abolition of slavery and Hull will lead the way in marking that event. Thirdly, as Hull’s first woman MP, I cannot miss the opportunity to celebrate the wonderful life of another Johnson from Hull who reached great heights. It is not my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, West and Hessle (Alan Johnson), remarkable though he is, but Amy Johnson, a strong, independently minded woman who lived in Hull for many years and followed her dream to become an aviator. She was keen to succeed in a project that would demonstrate that women could be as competent as men in a male-dominated field. She qualified as the first British-trained woman ground engineer and, of course, made her historic flight as the first woman to fly alone to Australia in 1930. I shall certainly look to Amy Johnson as an inspiration. I am lucky that my experience in local government and as a member of the London Assembly—together with other new hon. Members, I grappled with holding the Mayor of London to account—will stand me in good stead in the cut and thrust of politics at Westminster. Today, Kingston upon Hull, North consists of leafy avenues in the south of the constituency, filled with students and academics from the university, up to the council estate at Bransholme, bordering the East Riding. Although suffering from poor planning in the past and the economic blows of the 1980s, a strong community spirit survives in many of the people who moved from the fishing area in Hull to the new council estate in the 1970s. This area is now part of the pathfinder in Hull, which is very welcome. We have already seen community attempts at regeneration, with the award-winning community gym at the Dales working to get local people fitter. Work has also been done with disaffected young people to get them back on track. Even after eight years of a Labour Government and massive investment in our community, we still have more work to do in health and education in Hull. Hull is leading the way, however, in the introduction of free healthy school meals, alongside the Labour Government’s fresh fruit scheme, in all our primary schools. Those initiatives have been an amazing success. In one city centre school, there has been 98 per cent. take-up of healthy school meals. It is heartening to see small children either enjoying a healthy lunch of ““cowboy pie””, consisting of fresh meat and vegetables, or leaving school at the end of the day munching carrots and fruit. The long-term public-health benefits of such innovations will take time to see, but I believe that they are essential if we are to reduce the gap between the life expectancy of a baby born in Kingston upon Hull today—six years less—and a baby boy born in Kingston upon Thames today. Continuing with the theme of education, we also have a well established music service in Hull, which gives any child, including those with special educational needs, an opportunity to learn to play an instrument. That service survived the massive cuts to music education in the 1980s and has been fiercely protected in Hull. We need only to go along to a school concert at Thoresby or Fifth Avenue primary school to be impressed by the talents of the youngsters. I know that in Hull we need to build on the excellent work of our primary schools in order to get the results in the secondary sector. I am delighted that the Labour Government have awarded £200 million under the ““building schools for the future”” initiative to refurbish and rebuild our secondary schools, including—and, hopefully, at the top of the list—the Sir Henry Cooper and Kelvin Hall schools. The university of Hull sits in the heart of the constituency and I am particularly proud of the Hull and York medical school, which, opening only two years ago, was ranked second in The Guardian league tables of UK medical schools for 2005. The course attaches particular importance to good communication skills in medical training and clinical placements from early on in a student’s life. We now have the opportunity to develop a dental school on similar lines and I will be supporting and lobbying the Government on that in the coming months. I also want briefly to mention another innovation in Hull—the community warden service, which provides a reassuring presence on the streets of my constituency. It befriends and works with the elderly and the young. As a port city and a gateway to Europe, Hull has always had international links. It has just been awarded fairtrade status to show the outward-looking nature of many Hull people. Meanwhile, our local football team, Hull City, the Tigers, has just won year-on-year promotion and will be playing in the championship. We have a marvellous new stadium, known as the KC stadium, built in partnership with the Labour council, which has aided our team’s success. I am humbled to have been elected to represent such an interesting and challenging area. I will promote the city whenever possible and never forget my duty to improve the lives of people throughout the constituency. I will strive to serve all my constituents to the best of my ability.