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National Referendum on the European Union

I had no real background in politics when I was elected in 2005. I had been a soldier and a television reporter. In fact, I had never even been into the House of Commons Chamber. A couple of days before the House sat for the first time after the election, I wandered into the Members' Lobby and chatted to one of the security guards, who let me into the Chamber. It was dark, and I started to think about the historic things that had happened here. I thought of Winston Churchill leading Members out of the House to St Margaret's church to give thanks for the end of the second world war. And then I asked myself, ““Why are you thinking about yourself and how clever you are to have got here?”” Actually, this was about the thousands of voters in Gravesend, Northfleet and the villages who had allowed me to overturn quite a healthy Labour majority and replace it with a pretty tiny Conservative one. Did any of us imagine when we made our acceptance speeches at the counts that Members of Parliament would be slagged off to quite the degree that they are now? My mother does not like to tell people that I am a Member of Parliament, because of the response that she receives when she does.