Identity Documents Bill

I congratulate you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, on your magnificent election victory and elevation to the Chair. I am delighted to be able to give my maiden speech today, and pleased to be able to speak in a debate on the Identity Documents Bill, but given that this is my maiden speech, I hope you will forgive me if I drift into one or two other subject areas. I have enjoyed the excellent contributions made by many maiden speakers today, particularly those of my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) and my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Kris Hopkins), who has just disappeared from the Chamber. There is no greater honour, privilege or responsibility than being elected to Parliament to represent the constituency in which I grew up, was educated and have lived for most of my life. Selby and Ainsty is a new seat, which the Boundary Commission had the very good sense to create and, hopefully, will have the very good sense to keep. It is a largely rural seat with more than 100 villages and hamlets covering the area between York, Harrogate and Pontefract in the south. I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell that the residents of Sherburn-in-Elmet are more than happy with the current boundary arrangements. Selby is the largest settlement in the constituency. It is a market town, and although it was originally a shipbuilding town on the River Ouse, its economy is now largely based on agriculture, tourism to our stunning abbey, and its status as a commuter town for Leeds and York. We have significant historical connections with America, as can be seen in the 14th-century Washington window of Selby abbey, which bears the Washington family arms and is believed to have been used as the basis for the American flag, the Stars and Stripes. I urge all hon. Members to visit the abbey to see that wonderful spectacle. The bulk of the new constituency consists of the old Selby seat. I pay tribute to John Grogan, the former Member of Parliament for Selby, who was the first and last Labour Member to represent the constituency. I have always found him extremely courteous, and he has been an excellent local MP and advocate for Selby both in Yorkshire and in the House. Despite our obvious political differences, he and I share a number of interests. Given that the brewing town of Tadcaster is in the constituency, it is difficult not to be a fan of beer. In fact, you do not get to be my size without being a significant fan of beer. We are both also passionate supporters of Yorkshire county cricket club. He and many other hon. Members—perhaps even including you, Mr Deputy Speaker, although you represent a Lancastrian seat—will be thrilled that the world's greatest cricket club is riding high again in the county championship. Mr Grogan has expressed an interest in returning to the House and I wish him well in that endeavour, although not too well if he is considering a return to Selby. I pay tribute to John Grogan's predecessor, the late Michael Alison, who represented Selby and its predecessor Barkston Ash in the House. The fact that I took an interest in politics is down to him. I saw at first hand, as a child in the 1970s, the help that he gave my parents in attaining a grant to install central heating in our home. Some years later, I had the opportunity to repay that good deed. It was during the 1992 election. I received his campaign leaflet through my door with a hand-written note. I was very impressed, so I called his agent and asked whether there was anything that I could do to help Mr Alison's campaign in the election, however small. That offer of help was my first political mistake, as the following day around 1,000 leaflets arrived on my doorstep with a note that read,"““Please call the office if you need any more.””" In addition to the Selby district, the remainder of the new seat is referred to as Ainsty. There is not an actual place called Ainsty but, like Elmet, it is an ancient wapentake. The area is made up of four wards from the Harrogate borough and takes in villages west of York, skirting around Wetherby and Harrogate. The area was previously served in the House partly by David Curry, who diligently served as MP for Skipton and Ripon for 23 years, and partly by my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Miss McIntosh), who was the only ever Member for Vale of York. I welcome her, albeit belatedly, back to the House. Sadly, over recent years, we have seen an increase in unemployment and our area has lost many businesses, including chemical factories, the paper mill and the short-lived Selby coalfield. I have personal experience of redundancy and the despair that it can cause, so trying to get people back into work will be a personal priority for me. Coal mining has now disappeared from the constituency. As the grandson of a coal miner, I was thrilled to receive help from former coal miners canvassing and delivering leaflets in my election campaign, although not all the people from former mining communities have supported my endeavours and candidacy. May I share with Members a quick story that involves a recent family funeral in a village called Grimethorpe. Some Members may know that that is not yet a Conservative stronghold in South Yorkshire, but my cousin approached me to say that it was the first time that he had ever shaken hands with a Tory and that it would be the last. He went on to say:"““thee grandfather would be turning in his grave if he knew tha' wants to be a Tory MP””." I would like to think that my grandfather might also have been secretly proud. I know that my late mother would have been. The Selby and Ainsty seat does its bit for energy production with two large coal-fired power stations: Drax and Eggborough. Drax alone provides 7% of the UK's electricity needs. It has plans to build three new large-scale dedicated biomass plants alongside the co-firing facility at its existing coal-fired station, which could result in Drax becoming responsible for supplying at least 15% of the UK's renewable power and up to 10% of total UK electricity. The total renewable capacity could be enough to power 2 million homes, which is the equivalent output of 2,000 wind turbines. Regular readers of the Selby Times and The Press in York—I am sure that there are many of those in the House this afternoon—will be aware that in the seat there are several controversial applications, including for onshore wind farms and incinerators, which are causing great concern to local residents. A total of 30 turbines are in planning, each over 400 feet high and taller than power station cooling towers. More are being scoped by developers. If all the applications go ahead, the landscape of our district will be blighted by a forest of windmills that will do little to meet our desire to reduce carbon emissions. I agree that wind power should play a part in a mix of renewable sources, but it would be a better idea to install them where the wind blows fairly regularly: offshore. Residents elsewhere in the constituency face many different challenges, including several unauthorised Traveller encampments, where land has been bought and camps set up without permission. One of them is even masquerading as a caravan sales site, and just below that sales sign there is another sign saying, ““Enter at your own risk.”” That is not the most welcoming marketing slogan for a supposed caravan retailer. Local authorities must be given more powers to prevent such law-flouting, and I am encouraged by this Government's proposals to curtail the ability to apply for retrospective planning permission and to create a new criminal offence of intentional trespass. Law-abiding citizens are expected to jump through hoops if they want to build anything in rural areas, and it is plain wrong that certain groups get special treatment to bypass the rules. Small businesses are the lifeblood of the community in my constituency, and they are the engine room for any local economy. Like everyone, they have been hit hard by the recent downturn. They have been overtaxed and burdened with red tape. There is no better illustration of this than my county council's decision to ban on health and safety grounds Selby traders from placing an A-board on the pavement outside their premises. In the midst of a recession, I can think of no more ridiculous piece of over-zealous bureaucracy than to threaten small firms with large fines for daring to advertise their wares to potential customers. There are in my constituency the sites of two of the bloodiest battles ever fought in England: the battle of Towton in 1461 in the war of the roses, which resulted—quite rightly—in a decisive victory for the Yorkists, and the battle of Marston Moor in 1644, where Cromwell's parliamentarians prevailed. I am not an advocate of a return to civil war, but I am an advocate of civil liberties. Under the previous Government, there was an unprecedented attack on Britain's historic freedoms, and I am convinced that an ID card would be a further infringement of those freedoms. I promise that for as long as I sit in this House I will fight hard for the interests of my constituents, although my methods may be slightly less bloody than those adopted at Towton and Marston Moor. I am grateful to have had this opportunity to address the House for the first time, and I thank the good people of Selby and Ainsty for putting their trust in me. I intend to repay that trust with all I have.