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Adjournment (Whitsun)

It is a delight to be able to take part in this debate and especially to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink), who is an excellent and assiduous Member of Parliament. He was self-effacing, but he should not be, because he speaks with such passion for the constituents whom he represents so well. It has also be a great pleasure to listen to the maiden speeches today. It does not seem so long ago that I made my own maiden speech, but time passes quickly as one gets older. I look into the mirror and no longer see the same slim young man of eight years ago. He has been replaced by this rather grizzled figure. I am also made to feel old by how young the new Members look, although we also have some more senior Members. I was impressed by the enthusiasm of those who made their maiden speeches and their passion for being here. I hope that that stays with them, because after eight years as an Opposition Member, I have to say that a certain cynicism sometimes creeps upon me. I have been invigorated by that enthusiasm and I hope that I can recapture the fresh-faced enthusiasm that I had all those years ago. These debates are one of the better kept secrets of Parliament, and I hope that the new Members who have taken part realise that. The secret has been almost too well kept today, but it is good to see the same faces here. Such debates are a regular occurrence and I am delighted to be able to take part. As my hon. Friend the Member for Southend, West (Mr. Amess) said, we have been in our constituencies during the election and this debate gives us a great opportunity to raise some of the matters that were brought to us as we went around. I do not wish to detain the House too long—there is only so much it can take—but I do wish to raise a couple of points, linked by a transport theme. My hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening) mentioned Heathrow and the noise suffered in her constituency. I pay tribute to her predecessor, Tony Colman, who was assiduous in raising matters that affected those who live closer to the centre of London than those who live in Uxbridge and the borough of Hillingdon. Heathrow is in our borough and while it brings benefits, it also brings many problems. Alongside the current plans for a third runway, I notice that a sixth terminal is now creeping, worryingly, into the discussions, even though the Government have said that that is not in their plans. Anybody who knows the situation will realise that a third runway would mean a sixth terminal. That worries many people because in many instances it would destroy some villages, as would airport expansion wherever it is. That is why I have never in this House advocated not building at Heathrow and favoured somewhere else. We have to look seriously at our aviation needs. I was concerned earlier this week when a new lobby group was launched called Project Heathrow. I do not have a problem with people creating lobby groups. That is their right and I am pleased that they do it. This group is headed by a former Member of this House, now Lord Soley. I was concerned that the Secretary of State for Transport went to the meeting. I know this because on television I saw a cream cake land on him thrown by someone who was not too impressed by the idea of expansion. I do not condone that behaviour. My concern was caused by a lack of even-handedness. Many organisations that are opposed to further expansion of Heathrow and I have been trying to meet the Secretary of State to express our views, but unfortunately we have not been granted the same access as the lobby group was on Monday. The Minister is a fair-minded gentleman and I ask him to pass that on, so that when I write asking for a meeting it is borne in mind that even-handedness is a good thing at this level. We have a few problems with buses. I will not blame the Government for that because it is not their responsibility, but many of my constituents are concerned. By raising this on the Floor, I hope that those with responsibility will realise how seriously I and others take the matter. The London bus service has unquestionably improved greatly. People are using the buses more and more. In fact one of the problems results from more people using the buses—larger buses have been introduced. Two buses cannot pass each other in some of the smaller roads in my constituency, particularly Cleveland road in Cowley and Wise lane in West Drayton, without mounting the kerb, which they do regularly. Obviously that is a great danger to pedestrians. Many students go along Cleveland road to Brunel university and schoolchildren go to Uxbridge high school and Bishopshalt school. That causes great concern to residents. We do not want to lose the bus service, but something must be done. These debates are for local issues and my next item narrows the debate down to one particular bus stand in my constituency. It has caused more justifiable complaints than many other issues in the past few months. Because Hillingdon hospital has redeveloped and built houses on what was part of its site, the buses can no longer stand in order to stop and turn round where they used to. They now go down past residential homes—the very homes that were newly built. This has happened since Christmas. Other houses are also affected by this problem. You can imagine, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that from the early hours of the morning until late at night, just outside the houses, not only are buses stopping and going—before anyone says that this happens everywhere, I should say that there is a bus stop outside my house and I do have that noise but it moves on—but engines are left running, so the residents suffer from fumes as well as noise. The residents also have something that I never thought about until I looked into the matter. It is a practical problem that should be looked at, because the bus drivers do not have proper facilities for relieving themselves after driving for some time. I want to discuss this with the union because I am sure that the union would want such facilities for its members. As you can imagine, Mr. Deputy Speaker, this is not exactly enhancing the area, and one of the places that the bus stand affects is actually a residential home. The noise and all these other activities are causing a great deal of distress. At first we thought that we could get this problem sorted out fairly easily. We have been trying to get various people together, including the hospital, Brunel university and the London borough of Hillingdon—and Transport for London, which seems a little elusive in spots; I understand that that is not uncommon, but I am working on it and I hope that we can get it to resolve this matter. Meanwhile, the residents have become increasingly frustrated, and have started to mount peaceful protests. I have noticed that the buses have been delayed, shall I say, for 10 minutes or so, causing problems. I do not know whether there is such a thing as a normal protester, but if so these residents could not be described as such; they are just so frustrated by what is going on. We hear a lot, have heard a lot and are going to hear a lot more about respect. That theme has come up recently and I think we have all noticed that it is lacking in society. I read somewhere, and I think it is probably a better word, that what is actually lacking to a large degree in today’s society is consideration for others. That may show itself as antisocial behaviour in a community, as described by many hon. Friends and hon. Members, or lack of consideration by a company, which I would say is what we are seeing in this case. The company does not particularly want the problem but it is not moving fast to remedy it. I am raising this matter, which is of great concern to my constituents, on the Floor of the House today, in the hope that we will be able to speed up the process and get the problems sorted out.