15 April 2023
Grand National

65yrs today since Dad won the Grand National at Aintree Racecourse in 1958 riding the little Irish gelding #MrWhat to a famous Irish win 🏆

36yrs since Dads untimely death🙏 a broken man after a two decades grappling with head injury induced depression, addiction & gambling culminating in the all too familiar cycle of bankruptcy, divorce & family trauma.

5yrs since I launched the Bridge of Hope Careers in 2018 in his memory with
🤝The Racing Foundation
🤝my childhood buddy James Fellowes (who had suffered a mid-life collapse from undiagnosed bipolar disorder) and
🤝 Prosper 4 Group

to help others 🤝who’ve had a fall in life with a leg-up back into the saddle of fulfilling work.

Thanks to all those who backed us, over 60,000 people have now found work through our digital jobs portal:

ℹ️ Bridge of Hope Careers

https://lnkd.in/eQcVEEBg

RIP dad 🙏🤝

British Horseracing Authority
The Racing Foundation
Prosper 4 Group

#mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness
#neurodiversity #inclusiveemployment
#equinetherapy

 

14 April 2023
Meeting with NCC – Norfolk Innovation Economy

A busy Constituency Friday in Parliamentary Recess – starting with the regular Norfolk County Council briefing with local MPs this morning.

Too few policy makers in Whitehall are aware of the breadth of innovation, expertise and enterprise driving huge economic opportunities in our part of the world.

That’s why one of my central missions since being elected as MP for Mid Norfolk back in 2010 has been to do all I can to help put the Norfolk Innovation Economy firmly on the map.

Over recent years, Norfolk and the wider New Anglia region has become a cluster of so many world class hubs of science, innovation and enterprise.

It was a pleasure therefore to be introduced to innovative Norfolk seaweed and bio-plastic start-up initiatives and entrepreneurs on Friday’s call – all of whom are doing pioneering work in two highly exciting and rapidly growing sectors that could see our region leading the way, shaping the world of tomorrow, tackling some of the fundamental global challenges we face AND creating the jobs and opportunities that will boost prosperity here in our region.

Rest assured, I will continue to work with colleagues across the East, as well as in Government, to showcase and unlock Norfolk’s vast potential.

To learn more about my work promoting the Norfolk Innovation Economy, please click here

To learn more about my recent New Anglia Cluster visit as Minister of State at the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, please click here 

12 April 2023
Digital Connectivity

Digital Connectivity isn’t an optional extra in today’s society – which is why, yesterday, we set out:

  • Wireless Infrastructure Plan
  • £50m for 5G roll out
  • UK Spectrum Statement
  • Rural Connectivity Grant to enable use of One Web satellites for rural connectivity
  • £100m for 6G Research and Development

To find out more, click here.

12 April 2023
Easter Recess in Mid Norfolk

Easter Week with Parliament in Recess – a wonderful chance to have a full week in my Mid Norfolk constituency:

· Out and about on the High Streets and in the local community

· Making visits with local Breckland and South Norfolk councillors

· Working with my team in the constituency office in Wymondham

6 April 2023
Scarning Primary School

As I have pledged on each of the four election nights on which I’ve been honoured to be elected, I will always do my best to represent EVERYONE in Mid Norfolk – not just the people who voted for me.

I take that pledge incredibly seriously, and that’s why I was delighted to resume my regular schedule of constituency school visits again this past Friday – this time visiting Scarning Primary School.

It was a pleasure to speak to the pupils about the role of an MP and the story of how I became one. It was great to learn more about many of their own career aspirations too – also taking the opportunity to tell them about some of the incredible jobs and skills courses already here in our area.

I also appreciated the chance to sit down with Headteacher Nick King to find out more about how the school has been getting on since my last visit back in October 2019 (see more here) – as well as the challenges being faced in terms of SEND support in our local schools.

SEND support for our schools (both mainstream and specialist) continues to be a key campaign of mine and I have therefore committed to working with Nick and the school’s leadership team to help raise awareness of the challenges being faced – both locally and with ministers and officials in Westminster. (See more about my ongoing campaign work here)

I have also committed to convening a virtual call with all of Mid Norfolk’s school headteachers much like the one I now have quarterly with senior practice staff at our local GP surgeries (see more here).

Rest assured, I will continue to do all I can to support our local schools in the months ahead.

5 April 2023
North Elmham Garden Town

For decades now, our planning system hasnt been delivering the housing we need, in the places we need it, for the people who need it. For too long, the system appears to have been driven by the national volume house builders who too often make their money from land banking and high density commuter housing estates on the edge of existing developments – rather than through a proper planning system run to deliver for the people who need planning to work for them, instead of being done TO them.

Ive long been concerned by the amount of development coming to areas like our own in rural Mid Norfolk – which is often inappropriate, industrial” in scale and unsustainable. While most of our villages can take and are indeed up for (when properly asked) taking some additional new housing (without which our communities will gradually fade away), I fundamentally believe that more needs to be done to give local communities a greater say in how they develop in the years to come (with greater protections), which is why I have been so vocal in my opposition to the way so many large national developers abuse and take advantage of the planning system to dump such inappropriate and unsustainable developments on our towns and villages.
 
Thats why, through The Norfolk Way project I set up before I became an MP, I have been so vocal in advocating for a better model of growth and development that places greater emphasis on delivering small pockets of housing of the type and aesthetic desired by local communities, and in the places they earmark. I truly believe the spirit of Localism enshrined in the 2011 Localism Act should be enhanced, with the Act itself strengthened to remove some of the loopholes weve seen exploited. (To read more about my views in full, please visit my Planning and Protecting Our Rural Heritage and Landscapecampaign page here) I was delighted to see the NPPF reformed in the autumn by Michael Gove to give more power to local planners.

I continue to make the case I have long made that the right way to plan housing is to give local councils, democratically accountable to the local residents they serve, the freedoms and incentives to plan properly for the right sort of housing and growth where it is needed ie:

  • around hotspots of economic growth
  • on brownfield sites in areas needing regeneration
  • around growth towns with the infrastructure and services available to sustain further growth
  • in villages with a Neighbourhood Plan setting out the amount of housing they are happy/able to take and which ensures affordable & appropriate local housing for local workers and residents

Thats what the Breckland and South Norfolk Council Local Plans rightly aim to do. What we dont need in rural Norfolk is massive commuter estate “New Towns” dumped in the middle of rural mud Norfolk without proper infrastructure, facilities, sustainable transport links or fit with the existing pattern of development.

The North Elmham New Town

The North Elmham New Town would also represent massive development of the precious River Wensum chalk stream habitats (not to mention a Site of Specific Scientific Interest).

Thats why I was delighted to chair a meeting on Friday in North Elmham with local parish councils and local councillors Bill Borrett and Cllr Gordon Bambridge to make clear that the idea of a new town in the area will NOT be supported by ourselves as elected local  representatives.

Bill and Gordon confirmed that Breckland Council are NOT zoning this area for major housebuilding, and will oppose a re-application of the New Town as we did successfully last time it was proposed.

New Towns and Garden Villages

Whilst there are places in the UK where there may be a strong case for a new generation of garden towns and villages, with all of the necessary infrastructure and transport links (either to drive regeneration as in parts of the post-industrial North, or to alleviate the pressure around major growth hits spots like Cambridge), North Elmham is not a sustainable location.

I can think of several possible sites in East Anglia that could perhaps take such a garden town or village: specifically the dilapidated station sites on the Cambridge-Ely-Brandon-Thetford-Attleborough-Wymondham-Norwich railway line – as part of the Oxford-Cambridge East-West Railway Development Company I have championed over the years, and especially during my time as Minister for the Future of Transport at the DfT.
 
However, Ive also been very clear that, for any such development, we need to be sure that:

  1. Any such developments must avoid the loss of ancient woodland and high quality farmland
  2. We see a serious commitment to Net Zero and building into the plans a higher quality, cleaner, greener standard of life – not continuing to same old, lazy model of house dumping that sees thousands of additional vehicles tearing through old country lanes and causing more congestion and rat-running
  3. There is serious investment into public and private infrastructure – with proper road, rail, cycle and walking routes
  4. Any such development is planned appropriately and sustainably, and that it makes sense in the wider community context.

 
I have not seen any evidence to suggest that a garden town or village would be appropriate in this part of Mid Norfolk, and given the rural and inaccessible nature of North Elmham and the surrounding villages, the already serious congestion on the nearby road network and the nationally significant environmental and habitat importance of the Wensum Valley, I cannot envisage any circumstances in which this idea could be taken seriously.

To my mind, it would make far more sense for such a significant level of growth to be focussed down closer to the A11 Corridor – which Breckland Council themselves have, rightly, recognised is the key growth artery in our region and have tried to focus the bulk of the districts future growth. I know the Leader of Breckland Council, Cllr Sam Chapman-Allen, and both Cllr Bill Borrett and Cllr Gordon Bambridge strongly support this.

Thats why I was delighted to join the c12 local parish councils representing the areas that would be affected by this idea to make clear my opposition.

Next Steps

At the meeting we agreed some important Next Steps:

  • To reconvene a meeting of ALL the parish councils in the affected area after the forthcoming local elections on May 4th to make sure all write to Breckland Council formally to express their concerns.
  • Bill and Gordon and I will liaise to ensure all the local residents who object have their objections properly acknowledged by BDC.
  • I will invite my neighbouring MP, Jerome Mayhew, to join that follow-up meeting given a number of his Broadland communities are in close proximity to the site around North Elmham and would also be affected.
  • I will write to Michael Gove (Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities) and the Minister for Housing to make clear why any New Towns and Garden Villages should only be  delivered in the right locations with the associated connectivity, infrastructure and services required) and not in inappropriate locations with the obvious environmental, sustainability and transport issues this scale of development would inevitably threaten.

 Please be assured that I will keep on this in the weeks and months ahead.

 

5 April 2023
Watton High Street Visit

Having spent fifteen years helping small businesses get off the ground before coming to Parliament, and having previously served as a Business Minister on three separate occasions, I am a passionate supporter of Small Business. It is the true engine of our local, and national, economy.

That’s why I relished the chance to walk Watton High Street again with local councillors Claire Bowes and Tina Kiddell this past Friday. As ever, it was great to visit local shops such as Adcocks, Draper and Humphries Antiques and Edwards Newsagents to speak to business owners and staff.

The past few years have been particularly tough for so many of our local small businesses and so it was a valuable opportunity to speak directly with those on our high streets about the challenges and opportunities they currently face. Breckland Council, with their Future Breckland Plan initiative, are doing important work to support our market town high streets (see more here) and, from my regular conversations with ministers and officials, I am reassured that Government takes seriously the concerns of our high street retailers, as well as our SMEs more broadly.

Rest assured, I will continue to do all I can to support our local business community.

To find out more about my historic and ongoing work ‘Backing Local Business’, please visit my campaign page here.  

4 April 2023
Weasenham Visit – Flagship Housing Residents

Decarbonising buildings, especially our homes, is a vitally important part of the UK’s journey towards Net Zero emissions. However, how that decarbonisation is delivered is equally important.

That’s why I have been taking such a keen interest in a case brought to my attention by a group of local Flagship Housing residents in Weasenham concerning the difficulties they had experienced as a result of the installation of ground source heat pumps in their homes.

Having convened and chaired a meeting with residents and Flagship in February (see more here), I welcomed the chance to meet with everyone again this past Friday for an update on the works Flagship are carrying out to try and rectify the problems encountered.

Joined again by Cllr Robert Hambidge (who has been following the case closely and providing support himself), we were able to identify what progress had been made and which outstanding matters still need to be rectified before Flasghip’s own deadline of the end of May. I am pleased that Flagship are taking the situation seriously – with Managing Director Adrian Barber himself attending, alongside key members of his team.

Rest assured, I will continue to work with Robert and local residents to help ensure these new heating systems are up and running properly as soon as possible – and that all of their concerns are resolved.