HearFromYourMP

Previous message | Messages for this constituency | Next message

A very varied week in Westminster and in my constituency

Posted by Kate Green, MP for Stretford and Urmston, at 09:19, Mon 31 March 2014:

Some weeks my blog gets a bit delayed, as I don't manage to write it on time. This is one of those weeks. I'm writing this on Saturday, on my way back from a conference on the Work Capability Assessment (WCA) which disabled people who are claiming benefit undergo, and about which there is loads of controversy.

The discussion was, as expected, lively, and people also wanted to ask about the two big events that affected disabled people in parliament last week: the government's announcement that it was replacing ATOS, the company that carries out the WCA, with another company, because ATOS' performance has been so poor; and the vote in parliament last Wednesday on an overall cap on social security spending.

People aren't sorry to see the back of ATOS, but the problems with the WCA go much deeper, and won't be solved simply by changing the company name on the door. There were plenty of ideas at the conference about what else needs to change, and I took careful note of what was said.

As for the benefit cap, for which I voted, this is actually very popular with most of the public. However, I understand why disabled people are worried what it will mean for them, and so I was pleased to be able to discuss their concerns. Of course, the lack of a cap hasn't stopped George Osborne from already making savage cuts to social security, with working people bearing by far the largest share of his austerity measures, yet he still hasn't met his own targets, and we mustn't lose sight of that fact.

The level of the cap has to be set at the start of each parliament, and Labour would take a different approach. We would bear down on the drivers of the rise in social security spending - high rents going into the pockets of landlords, forcing up housing benefit; low pay that has to be subsidised by tax credits; the shocking level of youth unemployment. That's how we'd manage social security spend.

Last week in parliament also saw me in committees debating two more sets of regulations in my role as shadow minister. One debate was on a further set of regulations in relation to mesothelioma. The more work I do on this subject, the more I realise how much injustice remains to be put right.

The second debate was on government plans to stop reimbursement to employers of a proportion of the statutory sick pay that they can currently reclaim, and use the money to set up a new service to help to get people back to work more quickly if they fall ill instead.

I'm all in favour of enabling people to return to work more quickly after recovery, but small businesses are worried that they'll lose out. I was interested that the Tories on the committee didn't raise these concerns, and I was the one looking for reassurances on small businesses' behalf. The Tories say they're the party of business, but it seems its only big business they're interested in.

I've spent quite a lot of time in the past week visiting local schools. It was great to visit Acre Hall School to hear about their rebuilding plans, and I was glad to get the chance to ask the Minister to speed up the decision about funding for the rebuild in Education Questions in parliament on Monday afternoon. I've also made visits to St Hilda's school, to join their first walk-to-school road safety breakfast, as part of my Safer Trafford Streets campaign, and to Forest Gate to participate in a Q&A session with the pupils there. I'm very grateful for the warm welcome I received at all three schools.

I was also very pleased to attend a presentation for the Rhodes Foundation, which funds probation workers from Greater Manchester to visit other countries to learn how they supervise offenders, and bring back lessons we can apply here. The staff who presented at the event had been to Canada and the USA, and they came back with some great ideas. I was really inspired by their professionalism, and enthusiasm for putting what they'd learned into practice back home.

I've also attended a dinner in parliament hosted by Intu, who own the Trafford Centre, attended the Sindhi community cultural evening in Hulme, gone along to a reception in Westminster Abbey organised by Signhealth, to hear about a new report into the problems deaf people have in accessing decent health services, met campaigners from Action Cerebral Palsy and from Group B Strep Support (I have been working with constituents affected by each of these conditions) in parliament, attended a lunch with the Association of Colleges to discuss adult learning and spoken at two conferences on employment, one on getting more women into engineering and science and one on fairness at work. Back in my constituency I caught up with Manchester United Foundation, met the Greater Manchester Living Wage campaign, met Smaller Earth, who are helping with my campaign on safety on adventure activity holidays, hosted a community conference in Old Trafford to discuss race equality, and - something completely different - visited farmers in Partington to hear about their concerns. My constituency is very varied indeed!

Now I'm looking forward to the local Labour Party wine and cheese fundraising evening, hosted by Shirley and Cllr Kevin Procter. Shirley does the catering for all my social and fundraising events in the constituency, and she's fabulous. After my long and busy week in Westminster and in the constituency, I'm really looking forward to a relaxing time!