Thursday 18 October 2007

Rt Hon Harriet Harman MP, Leader of the House, speaking at a Parliamentary Press Gallery lunch, Westminster - "Speech as delivered.  Inevitably, it covered political points, which are not the responsibility of the Leader of the House of Commons Office"

Thank you very much indeed for inviting me..

Well, of course, we are here today in what is Day 11 of the "not-the-general-election campaign", and here we are in the Churchill Room not where I should have been in Corby in a Sure Start centre - and some of you actually might have been there with me. But we are all here today.

This is your Press Gallery lunch since the recess, and it is my job - as one of the business managers of the House - to ensure that it is business as usual.

But is does still strike me as bizarre to think that, this month, I am celebrating 25 years as being Member of Parliament for Camberwell and Peckham.

But I'm delighted after 25 years, especially having suffered 15 of those in  opposition, to find that we are in government - and that is a feeling that never, ever leaves me. Never taking for granted that we are  in Government. Delighted, too, to find myself to be Leader of the House, although quite baffled to find myself also to be Lord Privy Seal.

I also discovered myself to be chair of the trustees of Chevening.  So, I hope we will be able to use that as a real centre for debate and discussion, and bringing people together, on issues of equality and democracy - not just in this country but around the world.

I think it is, actually, a great combination to be deputy leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the House because, when John Prescott became deputy leader of the Labour Party and he had his ministerial responsibilities for transport, environment, local authorities and energy and the regions, he had a big ministerial job to do. The great thing about being Leader of the House as well as being deputy leader of the Labour Party is that I am around all the time and can benefit from the wisdom of people.

There have been occasions over the past 25 years when I've been on my way up - and there have also been occasions in the last 25 years when I have been on my way down. But I firmly hope that, where I am now is not on my way up, not on my way down. Exactly where I want to be, so I can do a bit of good. This is famous last words, but I definitely feel that, with my huge opportunities and my many new roles, that's where I am. But, like all MPs, like all ministers, the foundation of my work is being a Member of Parliament. Of course, nobody's a minister unless they are a Member of Parliament. And it is a huge honour and a privilege to be a constituency representative and a Member of Parliament. That's why I think none of us should have any sympathy for people who sulk about being kicked out of the cabinet, because actually what it means is that you are once again something which is a huge honour and privilege of itself - a Member of Parliament.

If being in the cabinet is the only reason for you being an MP, you certainly shouldn't be in the cabinet and you shouldn't even be an MP. I can't remember who it was that said that, but I can think of lots of people, obviously, who didn't say that.

My constituency is how I know what I want to do in government.  Families in Peckham tell me about their lives. The New Deal for Lone Parents and the National Childcare Strategy didn't not come from a think tank, a kind of intellectual construct. It just came from listening to lone parents and saying what was the problem in their lives.

My commitment to targets, my enduring and abiding commitment to those targets on the waiting lists came from seeing all those people in my advice surgeries in Peckham Town Hall, who literally cried as they showed me their letters that showed that they had got an operation for their hip replacement in two years time in Kings College hospital.

Being MP for Peckham also tells me about the world as well, because it's a place for many new, first-time arrivals in this country, coming to Peckham, as well as I know many august journalists and members of the Lobby live in Peckham.

It tells me that, whilst we think international development is what government ministers do, people think it's the three jobs they do as they work at to send money back to their village in Nigeria. So, it tells me about domestic policy, it tells me about international policy, being MP for Peckham.

There's been much very healthy discussion about the renewal of the government's programme after 10 years.  But what I feel - and I know that many parliamentary colleagues feel - is that it is not just our values and commitments to fairness and equality, but it's also through listening that we work out what our agenda is. So, that's why, as deputy leader of party I have a programme which, I'm afraid, is cringingly entitled - Harriet in the High Street!

But, unfortunately, it's not about shopping! It's about listening to what people are saying in  the different High Streets, around and about the country. I have found that I can go up to people in any High Street, I can introduce myself to them, say hello, and stop them for a chat about politics. And it is incredibly interesting and enables me, without having to have loads of security, without having a national posse of media but obviously telling the local press out of politeness. And people tell me what is actually going on.

But I think you do have to not just listen in a neutral way but listen with a progressive ear. That means listening to people who don't have the loudest voices. Because they are women, because they are poor, or because they are immigrants.

So what I hope to do, with all my new jobs and with the guidance of my constituents and all the shoppers in the High Street I meet, and all my parliamentary colleagues, is mostly about families, equality and democracy.

We've done loads of things on all those fronts, but there are still women tearing their hair out, wondering how they are going to find good childcare that they can afford.  There is a growing number of people not only working and bringing up their children but also caring for older relatives. Most older people are not in residential care, they're not in sheltered housing. They're living on their own, and they need the support of their family around them. And we need to make sure that families can give them that support.

Being a government minister, with lots of  fantastic jobs, doesn't however mean you can definitely do all the things that you want to do. Sometimes there are still colleagues who can't see the light and who need a bit of persuasion.

I just mention one issue - that's the question of domestic violence.  I think we have done a huge amount to tackle domestic violence. But surely it cannot be right that it is almost impossible to be found guilty in this country of murdering your wife, because of what happens when a man kills his wife or partner. Even as in one particular case I'll mention although there is two a week, every week, every year.

This man, who was a solicitor, planned to kill his wife. He went out and bought a knife, intending to kill her with it. He came back, stabbed her and killed her in front of the four children but didn't face a murder charge. Because he was able to say, as he is encouraged to do under our law: it wasn't my fault, it was her fault, because I thought she was leave me because she had feelings for the karate instructor. That's all you need to get off a charge of murder and face only a charge of manslaughter. But I would say about that is that it is a concern that I have which I would describe as "work in progress".

Now, as I said, I have been a very long time in the House of Commons. And mostly when people have been an awfully long time in the House of Commons they become quite fuddy-duddy and think everything was brilliant then and nothing should change.

It's had quite the opposite effect on me. You know that phrase, "the House at its best."  That should be a signal to all of us that that is the House at its worst - pompous, self-satisfied, self-serving, overly-intellectual, nothing remotely to do with anybody out in the country, patronising. I think the House did not use to be at its best. I think the best days of the House lie ahead of it, not behind it. The House wasn't at its best when it was debating in the small hours of the morning.  It wasn't  at its best when there was when I first arrived 97% men MPs and only 3% women.  The House is better now than it was.  I would say a lot of it is down to former Leaders of the House, including Robin Cook, and also to  the new wave of women MPs from 1997. 

Now we debate a much broader range of issues - maternity services and afterschool clubs as well as motorways and the money supply. That's how it should be. 

I think people now have much higher expectations of Members of Parliament. Our constituents have much higher expectations than they use to have. Nowadays, people want to know exactly what we are going to do. They want us to write letters explaining what we are going to do. That's why, as Leader of the House, I am a strong supporter of the increased Members' allowances. I know they are a terrific target for the press, but they enable us to have the support which Members of Parliament need to do their job properly on behalf of their constituents.

And I also do want to ensure, as Leader of the House, that Ministers statements are genuinely new information, so you get bags of important stories arising from the chamber but, above all, so that Members of Parliament are the first to be able to ask questions. I want to be sure that backbenchers can arrange debates on hot topics and questions on hot topics, without waiting weeks. Hopefully, there will be more change in the pipeline.
 
I just want to finish by saying things about structural problems, about inequality, which I feel are in our democracy. There is a problem of inequality in constituencies. Urban areas, areas of black and Asian communities, areas of mostly rented accommodation as opposed to home-owners. They are under-represented in the House of Commons, because the electoral register is the basis for the boundaries.

And the electoral register under-represents you if you are young, black, living in rented accommodation in an urban area. And you are most unlikely not to be on the electoral register - only 2pc likely not to be on the register - if you are over 50, white, own your own home and liver in a metropolitan area. Whereas, if you are young, black, live in rented accommodation in a metropolitan area, you are 30pc likely not to be on the electoral register. And it is the electoral register that provides the basis for the parliamentary boundaries. We should have eight more Members of the House of Commons representing London. It's the same for Manchester and in Birmingham.

Ands I remember all those heated debates when the Tories would kick up like mad about supposed over-representation of Scotland and Wales, but they remain tranquil about the fundamental structural inequality that we have in our democracy. I don't think we should be tranquil about it. We have go to sort out that problem of inequality.

To conclude, I have got many different roles, but they all fit together around equality and democracy.  I hope that we will have much more equality and much stronger democracy. As a major contribution along that road, I've just done an hour of Business Questions. I hope everybody will ignore the discussion we had about the shooting gallery and the potential swimming pools (at the Palace of Westminster).

I am looking forward to answering your questions. I am sure that your questions will be more challenging than Theresa May's, but I do have my own red lines. You know the Prime Minister has four red lines. Well, I've got two red lines, which are about no questions, please, on these two subjects - shoes and handbags!