Diana Johnson, Labour MP for Hull North

The old saying that a week is a long time in politics certainly applied this week.

We started of thinking that this would be a fairly quiet period at Westminster, just before the end of the current Parliamentary session and the Queen’s Speech. Then,  half way through the Parliamentary Labour Party’s weekly meeting on Monday evening, we found out that the Lib Dem Leader had been forced out. This was a shock to a lot of MPs, including many Lib Dems. 

Many people in Hull would sympathise with the description of many Lib Dems given by their Portsmouth South MP Mike Hancock (see http://politics.guardian.co.uk/libdems/story/0,,2192059,00.html).

As the Prime Minister said on Wednesday, at this rate all Lib Dem MP could have an opportunity to be their Leader before the end of this Parliament!

We are now running up to the end of the session and most MPs are looking forward to the Queens Speech on 6 November. This will be the first time that the Prime Minister has already pre-announced what will be in the speech. This is another welcome Labour modernisation of the workings of the House.

I am delighted that Friday 19 October sees Freedom Road, a group of very talented young people from Hull, performing live at the Commons at the reception to mark the bi-centenary of William Wilberforce’s Abolition of the Slave Trade Act.

Council housing in Hull

I was delighted to speak at the Hull United Residents and Tenants Associations (HURAT Federation) AGM on Tuesday 11 September 2007. I share their view that tenants and residents need to play a much more important role in housing in the city and especially its regeneration.

Currently, many council tenants feel that Hull’s Lib Dem Council is failing to communicate effectively with tenants who have been flooded with details of exactly what repair work they can expect to their homes and when it will be finished. This is an issue that I have been raising with the Chief Executive of the council on several occasions.

NHS Stroke Services in Hull

On Friday 14 September, I had the opportunity to visit Ward 2 at Castle Hill, which is the rehabilitation ward for stroke victims and people with head injuries. The staff, as ever in the NHS, were dedicated and focused on providing the very best care for patients.  Staff talked to me about some of the issues they face and although they felt that more investment was required, they felt that good progress had been made in improving local stroke services over the past decade.  I have now had the privilege of seeing the Ward 110 at Hull Royal Infirmary, which is a dedicated acute stroke ward and community facilities and have been very impressed.

The average stay on Castle Hill’s Ward 2 is quite lengthy and is often followed with a stay in community rehabilitation before finally returning home. It is heartening to hear that in Hull we are now below the average for mortality rates from strokes and that the reconfiguring of the service some years ago is making a real difference to stroke victims. I know that the extra investment in our local NHS is vital, and welcomed by everyone in the city, but there is still far more we need to do.

Working with local police 

Last week, I spent a day with neighbourhood policing and then two days with the major Incident Team. Seeing Police Officers and Police Community Support Officers working alongside members of the community, from the elderly to young people, was very positive.

I was also impressed by the officers who deal with some of the most difficult work that the police have to handle, especially murders and suspicious deaths.  I saw for myself both officers and support staff working to gather evidence and painstakingly build a case, often in very distressing and upsetting circumstances, including the brutal and violent deaths of vulnerable people.

As primary school pupils returned to school this month, many parents and children have told me how dismayed they are to see the demise of the free healthy school meals policy in all our primary schools and special schools. 

Hull’s pioneering ‘Eat Well Do Well’ policy, introduced by Labour, aimed to improve the health and educational achievement of our youngsters. In the longer run it has the benefit of improving the health of our citizens, allowing them to enjoy healthier, longer and more independent lives, with more economically productive lifestyles and a higher standard of living.

I know from talking to many teachers that they have noticed a real difference in class and a very positive approach to learning by pupils through the healthy free school food. With Hull’s pioneering policy of making the healthy food free to all, without means-testing, we have also seen the uptake increase in some schools to over 90 per cent. Take up generally doubled across the city. This bucked the national trend for getting schoolchildren to eat healthy school food.

I recently met with Professor Colquhoun of Hull University who has remarked that the city of Hull has been getting a huge amount of positive publicity from this scheme, and other areas of the country with similar problems to Hull are now following Hull’s lead in introducing pilot schemes for free school meals.

The abandoning of the scheme is due to Hull’s Lib Dem Council withdrawing funding from the scheme - without even waiting for the final evaluation of the ‘Eat Well Do Well’ scheme by the University of Hull.

Hull’s Lib Dem councillors, supported by the Tories, have taken a short sighted approach that endangers progress in improving the life chances and well-being of all our children.

I feel passionately disappointed that a scheme that could have such long term benefits for the city has been abandoned without even a cursory glance at the excellent outcomes for many of our young people.