Former
Welcome to my website and blog.
You can read a bit more about who I am and what makes me tick here. A summary of the work I did when I was Labour MP for Birmingham Northfield between 1992 and 2019 can also be found here.
The older posts on here date from my time as an MP but I have continued to blog since leaving Parliament.
The opening paragraphs of my blog posts appear at the bottom of this page in reverse date order. The “Read on” buttons take you to what I have written in full. My posts below also contain links to articles I have written and which have been published elsewhere, together with posts imported from my own Facebook page.
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These are the main subjects on which I’ve written. Click here to view the full list of categories.
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Real elation that every living Israeli hostage is now free. Even one still held would have continued the nightmare. It carries on for many Palestinians Israel has abducted. I wrote about Dr Husam Abu Safiya in February . Why is he still in captivity?
Last week, our chair @richardburden27 published on his own website some personal reflections about what Remembering Srebrenica has meant for him this year.

Israeli forces are said to have dropped more explosives on Gaza than fell on London, Dresden and Hamburg combined in the Second World War. The level of destruction is hard to fathom as is the humanitarian suffering.
Our Foreign Affairs Correspondent @SecKermani looks at the…
A year to the day after BMW announced they were to sell Rover Richard Burden (MP Birmingham Northfield) will join Stephen Byers, the Trade and Industry Secretary, as he gives a keynote address to a major manufacturing conference organised by the AEEU.
Mr. Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield): I can tell my right hon. Friend and my hon. Friends in Luton and surrounding constituencies that, with Longbridge in my constituency, the people of the west midlands well understand what they will be going through and the anger that will be felt about the way that General Motors announced its decision. I imagine that they will take as dim a view of the …
Mr. Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield): One day, I should like to ask my right hon. Friend a question about something other than Rover, but today is not the day. Will he join me in congratulating John Towers and his team on proving all the critics wrong and acquiring Rover Cars for the Phoenix consortium? Does he agree that the great thing about the Phoenix bid is that it has been a real co …
Richard Burden MP (Lab: Birmingham Northfield) whose constituency contains the Longbridge plant and is home to 2,500 of its workers has today welcomed the success of the Phoenix Consortium’s bid to buy Rover from BMW. Mr Burden said: ‘This really is excellent news. Many people have been working so hard to achieve this result and it will be greeted with great relief by my constituents and …
Labour MP Richard Burden, whose constituency includes Longbridge in Birmingham, gives his reaction on the Phoenix deal to buy Rover to BBC News Online When I last wrote for BBC News Online back in March, the West Midlands was reeling from the shocking news that BMW had decided to break up and sell off the Rover Group, putting tens of thousands of British jobs at risk. The reaction in the Midlands …
Mr. Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield): Is it not a fact that the people of Longbridge, the workers of Rover and, indeed, everyone else, were assured by BMW that it was in for the long term? It was not just in words. New plant for the new Mini was still going in at the very time that BMW made the announcement; indeed, work was still going on last week. Is it not important that we look to the …
Mr. Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield): Yesterday in Prime Minister’s questions, I said that the entire midlands area was holding its breath, waiting on the BMW board meeting that was to take place today. We now know the result. The responsibility for what looks like befalling Longbridge and other large parts of the Rover group is that of BMW. The day after the announcement in 1994 …
The news from Munich this week has left the Midlands in a state of shock. As the region comes to terms with BMW’s appalling decision to break up the Rover group, many thousands of people are in fear for their jobs. The workforce at Longbridge, quite rightly, feel betrayed by BMW. And the break up of Rover means uncertainty not only for Rover workers themselves but for the 50,000 or so …
I was Labour Member of Parliament for Birmingham Northfield between 1992 and 2019 and a former Shadow Transport Minister. I now chair Healthwatch in Birmingham and Solihull, and the West Midlands Board of Remembering Srebrenica. I also work as a public affairs consultant. I am an effective community advocate and stakeholder alliance builder with a passion for human rights. I am a trustee of the Balfour Project charity and of Citizens Advice Birmingham, and a former Chair of Medical Aid for Palestinians.
