Welcome to my latest Parliamentary newsletter which covers local issues and developments as well as my actions in Parliament. This includes the response to the EU Referendum and the upcoming Labour Leadership contest, as well as local updates such as the reopening of Shopmobility and the fundraising for Sheila Dumbleton. I hope all of you and those close to you have a wonderful summer. In …
Leadership means understanding your part in building a social movement, not believing you are the personification of one. By Richard Burden Originally published by HuffPost, July 24, 2017 Traitors, backstabbers, Red Tories, Blairite plotters … all of us who have called for a change in Labour Leadership have had these kinds of labels thrown at us in recent weeks. Often they come from keyboard …
Three weeks ago it all felt so different. Britain had not yet voted to leave the European Union. The Pound had not plummeted. The Bank of England had not yet had to step in to steady the situation. The Prime Minister had not announced his resignation and the UK’s major political parties had yet not appeared to be in turmoil. None of us have lived through anything quite like this before and nobody …
Tomorrow, the Chilcot Report into the Iraq war will finally be published. Ahead of publication, my thoughts have gone back to how it felt in the House of Commons – and outside – at the time. Sometimes it is easy to get hindsight mixed up with what we knew at the time, as we approached a conflict that was going to have such a profound effect on the Middle East and beyond. It was a …
On Wednesday I urged the PM to put mechanisms in place so Birmingham and Midlands voices are heard in preparatory talks and negotiations with the EU over Brexit.
Watch it here:
Yesterday I wrote to members of my Constituency Labour Party on the challenges ahead after last week’s referendum. This is what I said: Dear Member/Supporter, Describing the events of the past week or so as momentous doesn’t really come close to it, does it? Britain votes to leave the European Union of which we have been part of for over forty years. And by doing so our country enters …
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.