Valedictory Debate

Lord Lansley Excerpts

Thursday 26th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Andrew Lansley (South Cambridgeshire) (Con)]

It is a great privilege to follow the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford); I found much in his speech with which to agree. I am sorry we did not have more opportunities to agree on precisely those things over these years, but he justified in his career his remark about leaving Ministers in their office. He showed tremendous capacity as local government and housing Minister, and was much admired for his work in this House.

You and I entered the House in 1997, Mr Speaker, as part of the small Conservative intake. I am choosing not to stand again, but I and our 1997 colleagues wish you well for the future. I will look on with pride at that intake. I remember way back when, as we were engaging in—what did we call it?—in-flight refuelling in opposition against the Labour Government’s large majority, we learnt some of the tricks of the trade of parliamentary life, and the 1997 intake has demonstrated some skill in that area in subsequent years.

[Mr Straw]

I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the felicity of the 1997 intake.

[Mr Lansley]

As ever, the right hon. Gentleman is very kind. Just as the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich mentioned that he shared an alma mater with my right hon. Friend the Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Sir John Stanley), the right hon. Member for Blackburn and I share an alma mater. I followed him there and I followed him here, albeit with a slightly bigger time lag.

I want to make some remarks from my heart. First, I want to thank my constituents. I hope they agree with many of the things for which I fought on their behalf in the constituency—infrastructure, the A14, the rebuilding of Papworth hospital, broadband infrastructure, the planning, maintaining our quality of life, supporting research and development and science, and making it the best place in the world for life sciences investment and one of the best in the world for any kind of scientific or high-tech investment. We talk about the Cambridge phenomenon, and a great part of it is in South Cambridgeshire; we can honestly say that we are the eastern powerhouse. I hope it is not hubris to say that I leave my constituency in extremely good shape and with a quality of life among the best in the country.

I also want to say a big thank you to Michael Howard and to the Prime Minister. They gave me the chance to be the Conservatives’ shadow Health Secretary for seven years—contrary to what the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich said, I had a long tenure in that post—and then the privilege of serving as Secretary of State for Health. Supporting the NHS and improving the health of the people of this country has been my passionate commitment in Parliament. In opposition, we fought for safer care and, in government, we got it. In opposition, we secured the highest ever level of public trust in the Conservative party’s policies for the NHS. In government, we delivered on our commitment to increase the NHS budget in real terms and to safeguard the NHS in tough times. I know that commitment will be sustained by a Conservative Government in the years to come.

I was determined to do more—to achieve the reforms in the NHS that virtually all recent Secretaries of State knew were needed but had not been secured. Many say that I implemented a reorganisation of the NHS that I promised not to do. That is not true. The Conservative manifesto had no reference to “no top-down reorganisation”. I was elected on the Conservative manifesto and I delivered it, including rising real NHS resources; getting rid of political targets; using information and choice to drive better outcomes; creating a strong, independent NHS voice, with GPs at the heart of commissioning; creating Healthwatch to represent patients; cutting administration costs by a third to increase front-line staffing; commissioning a 24/7 service, with GP access from 8 to 8; setting up the 111 service; virtually eliminating the longest waits for operations; cutting infections to record lows; abolishing mixed-sex accommodation; more than 1 million more people getting NHS dentistry; establishing the cancer drugs fund, with 60,000 benefiting from access to the latest treatments; and reforming social care so that people no longer have to sell their homes to pay for their care.

We did that and more. With our Liberal Democrat colleagues, we established health and wellbeing boards, with public health responsibilities and the capacity to integrate health and care. It was not easy and it was not popular, but public service reform is not a popularity contest. It must and will survive. It needs to survive because it will make a big difference in the future. My Back-Bench colleagues were robust, solid and consistent in their support, and I thank them and the Prime Minister for backing reform. The reality will show through in the years ahead, as we have seen in recent announcements, not least from NHS England.

I had a career before coming here and I will have a career after leaving, but I will always remain proud of what we have done here, as well as thankful for the comradeship of colleagues, those with whom I have worked, the staff of the House, the staff in my office and so many across my constituency.

When we are here, we trade blows and we take a lot of blows, but it is probably our families who feel them the most. They cannot go into the arena and fight back, but they feel the pain at least as much as ever we do. I want to say a big thank you to Sally and my family.

I would like to conclude, if I may, with a quote from Teddy Roosevelt, who said:

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds”.

I have always striven to leave my constituency and the country better for my efforts. I may have erred, but I have always cared deeply for my constituency and my causes, and I will continue to do so. Time will be my judge. I am content to have been a man in the arena.

[Mr Speaker]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for what he said. It might be helpful to the House to know that there are 13 colleagues still seeking to catch my eye, and I am looking to call the wind-up speeches from the Front Bench at approximately 4.10 pm. Members can do the arithmetic for themselves. It is roughly five minutes each, but no more.

[Mr Frank Doran (Aberdeen North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr Lansley). We served together on the House of Commons Commission for a number of years and learned a lot about each other.

I was first elected in 1987. I have to say it was an accident, because I did not expect to win. I took a Conservative seat that had only ever once been won by my party, when Donald Dewar won it in 1966. It is quite an experience when one does not expect to be elected. I lasted until 1992 when the inevitable happened and I lost the seat, but I managed to come back in 1997 as a retread. I now have had what I think is likely to be the unique privilege of representing three separate seats in the city of Aberdeen—Aberdeen South, Aberdeen Central and Aberdeen North—all because of boundary reviews. In the 23 years that I have represented the city, I have been moving firmly further north. I am now, I think, the most northerly Labour Member of Parliament.

This year, we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first discovery of viable quantities of hydrocarbons in the North sea. In that time, Aberdeen has grown from a city that depended on agriculture, fishing and light engineering to become the undisputed energy capital of Europe. It has been a privilege and an honour to have represented the city for 23 years.

The oil industry has brought great wealth to the city, but it has also brought tragedy. The Piper Alpha disaster in 1988 was, with 167 deaths, by far the worst disaster in any offshore industry in the world. The impact and the aftermath have been a huge part not just of my political life, but my life generally. It is not something one shakes off easily. When preparing for these sorts of events, one tends to pick out the main areas that one has concentrated on. I have concentrated on the Piper Alpha disaster and its consequences for offshore health and safety.

I have had a substantial number of opportunities. One I want to say a little about was the part I played in the minimum wage legislation. I think the right hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire was a member of the Public Bill Committee along with you, Mr Speaker. We spent many happy nights in Committee. I remember one occasion when we sat through the night from 10.30 on Tuesday to 1 pm on Wednesday. We were prepared and the other side were not, and I have to say we enjoyed it immensely. I have also spent much of my political life on trade union issues, and I am proud to have been for 14 years—until relatively recently—the secretary of the trade union group of Labour MPs, which works closely with the trade unions. I have always valued that connection.

I have followed a different career from most. I became the first Chairman of the Administration Committee when it was formed in 2005, and from there I graduated to the Commission, on which I have served with you, Mr Speaker, for the whole of this Parliament, and, as I said, with the right hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire. I learned a lot from my time with both Committees about how this place is run, and on this point I think we have to work harder. I quickly discovered how much I did not know about how this place operated and functioned, and I think most Members are in the same position; they do not find out about something unless they need to. There does not seem to be a ready need to find out how this place functions and is managed, or about the many staff it employs.

[Mr Lansley]

When we went through the night, I discovered the merits of a fully-fledged bathroom downstairs in the House of Commons.

[Mr Doran]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman; I now have a minute left.

The other Committee I have taken an interest in, was a member of and became Chair of was your works of art committee, Mr Speaker. I am proud of and have enjoyed the work I have done on that committee. However, probably the most enjoyable experience of my life—sitting next to my wife, I think this is saying quite a lot—was when the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, of which I was a member, visited Hollywood to look at the film industry and I managed to spend two hours on my own with Maureen O’Hara and Jean Simmons. I challenge any Member to beat that.

Like everyone else, I want to thank the staff of the House, particularly the Clerks on the various Committees I have been involved with, and especially my loyal staff in Aberdeen, most of whom have been with me for a very long time and have kept me sane for most of it.