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  • Gareth Bacon – 2023 Parliamentary Question on Metro Mayors and Foreign Direct Investment

    Gareth Bacon – 2023 Parliamentary Question on Metro Mayors and Foreign Direct Investment

    The parliamentary question asked by Gareth Bacon, the Conservative MP for Orpington, in the House of Commons on 9 February 2023.

    Gareth Bacon (Orpington) (Con)

    What recent discussions her Department has had with Metro Mayors on attracting more foreign direct investment.

    The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Kevin Hollinrake)

    I met Andy Street this week to talk about foreign direct investment, and Lord Johnson will meet the 10 Metro Mayors today and look to discuss how we can attract more investment into mayoral combined authorities and how the Department can connect strategic regional opportunities to major international capital, such as the sovereign investment partnerships that have been established over the past 18 months by the Department and the Office for Investment.

    Gareth Bacon

    I chair the all-party parliamentary group for London as a global city, and last year we published our first report, which featured analysis of the London-plus effect, a term coined by the London & Partners agency to show that our capital is the gateway to the world and that companies that first invest in London go on to contribute £7.6 billion and create 40,000 jobs throughout the country. Is my hon. Friend’s Department willing to consider convening roundtables with the Metro Mayors on how to maximise the potential benefit to the UK of the London-plus effect?

    Kevin Hollinrake

    My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Andy Street was very clear about the importance of London to regional development in the west midlands. The Department convenes roundtable joint sessions with the M10 Metro Mayors twice every year, in additional to ongoing ministerial-mayoral bilaterals and official-level engagement. Such meetings include the discussion of shared priorities in respect of international trade and investment and of greater collaboration throughout all regions to increase foreign direct investment from new and existing investors.

    Chris Elmore (Ogmore) (Lab)

    The Minister will know that there are no Metro Mayors in Wales, but there are city deals and leaders that link across the south-west of England into Bristol and across the south Wales belt. Will the Minister set out what he is doing to work with local government leaders in Wales to ensure that investment is brought into Welsh constituencies as well as those throughout England?

    Kevin Hollinrake

    The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. We are pleased that across York and North Yorkshire we are about to get our own Metro Mayor; I am sure he is working hard to bring that kind of governance to his area too, because it clearly delivers opportunity right across the country. As he knows, the FDI stock in the UK is worth £2 trillion, which is the second highest amount in the world. I am sure the opportunities would be beneficial to the hon. Gentleman’s constituents should he strike that kind of deal.

  • Gareth Bacon – 2022 Speech on the Expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone

    Gareth Bacon – 2022 Speech on the Expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone

    The speech made by Gareth Bacon, the Conservative MP for Orpington, in Westminster Hall, the House of Commons, on 20 December 2022.

    It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. I, too, thank my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) for securing this important debate. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer), who was right that I have taken a deep interest in the ultra low emission zone expansion for some time, and that is because there are a number of big problems with the policy.

    The first problem is that Sadiq Khan does not have a mandate for this policy. He claims that ULEZ expansion is essential to tackle air pollution, and we heard his briefing being faithfully read out by the hon. Members for Swansea West (Geraint Davies) and for Putney (Fleur Anderson). Given that the Mayor was re-elected to City Hall only last year, we would imagine that this policy featured prominently in his manifesto, but it did not. He went to the polls on a 100-page manifesto, and one paragraph on page 55 mentioned the ultra low emission zone, but it pertained specifically to the extension to the north and south circular in October 2021, which he had already announced. There was no mention whatever of expanding the boundary to the outer part of Greater London.

    When the Mayor decided in May this year to push ahead with that expansion, the Evening Standard article that covered the announcement said:

    “On Friday morning, Sadiq Khan insisted that he would not press ahead with the plans if the public overwhelmingly rejected them during the public consultation.

    He said: ‘It’s a genuine consultation—as were the previous two consultations in relation to the central London Ultra-Low Emission Zone and the expansion. I hope Londoners who care about the health of their families will respond.’”

    They did, in large numbers, but the Mayor initially refused to release the results of that consultation. Eventually, after public pressure, the results were released on 25 November. They revealed that 60% of respondents opposed Sadiq Khan’s ULEZ expansion to outer London. That figure increases to 68% when we include the organised responses that the hon. Member for Swansea West mentioned; 70% of outer London residents oppose the expansion and 80% of those who work in outer London were also opposed.

    This policy has no mandate and no public support. It turns out that it is not about air quality, either, contrary to the propaganda read out by Opposition Members, which comes directly from the briefing sent by the Mayor of London. The document I quoted earlier is not a hatchet job, but the Mayor’s own integrated impact assessment. I gave one example, but there are many, of where it uses phrases like “negligible to minor” in terms of the impact that the expansion would have on air quality.

    There is no mandate, there is no public support and it is not really about air quality, because the impact is negligible. So why is the Mayor of London so interested in ULEZ expansion, and why is he rushing it? The answer is as old as time: it is about money. This is a cash grab, pure and simple. According to Transport for London’s own figures, it expects the £12.50 charge to hit 160,000 cars and 42,000 vans per day. In monetary terms, that is about £2.5 million per day—a big cash injection into the Mayor’s coffers.

    There is a question about timing. When the inner and outer ULEZs were introduced, people had years to prepare. In this case, we have nine months. The average family cannot save up to buy a car that quickly, especially when household bills are rising, and we know that they are. Small businesses and charities may be forced to replace one vehicle or even a fleet that they had banked on being able to use for many years to come.

    Who will be hit? The Mayor of London does not seem to understand who will pick up the bill for his policies. It is not wealthy Londoners—it is ordinary working people, on the poorer end of the socioeconomic spectrum, who are less likely to be able to upgrade their car, and more likely to own an older vehicle. There is a myth that Mayor Khan attempts to spread around that low-income Londoners do not own cars, or drive in Greater London. That is categorically false. What is more, he knows it. The “Travel in London” report produced by TfL in 2019 shows that, by its own analysis, 50% of outer London households earning as little as £10,000 own a car. Car ownership rockets to in excess of 70% for those earning upwards of £20,000. According to TfL’s impact assessment, low-income Londoners are more likely to own non-compliant vehicles. The ULEZ expansion is not a tax on wealthy drivers, but on poorer people who simply cannot afford to buy a new vehicle.

    In my constituency, we do not have tubes or trams. We have trains that go into central London and we have private vehicles. Some 83% of Orpington households own a car, meaning that a great number of my constituents could be liable to pay the charge. As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), many of my constituents use their car every day to go to work, to the shops and to visit family and friends. Under the Mayor’s plan, they face a potentially disastrous annual bill of £4,500.

    Other Members have spoken about the impact on public services. More than half of Greater London’s police officers and firefighters and around a fifth of the workers in my local NHS trust come into Greater London from outside. Those who work in outer London and those who work in shift work are especially reliant on their cars. Someone on a night shift faces a double whammy of a £12.50 charge driving to work, and a £12.50 charge after midnight when they drive home. It could cost them £25 per shift to go and do their work.

    The ULEZ expansion will also impact on businesses in outer London. Many people drive in from Kent to shop in Petts Wood in my constituency. TfL estimates that 8% have non-compliant vehicles. Rather than paying £12.50 a time, many will simply choose to shop and visit elsewhere, depriving London’s high streets of customers.

    Many drivers, both in London and those who travel from outside to work, shop or visit outer boroughs, are unaware that they may face an even higher bill. We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford about the increase in the level of fines—up to £180. The Mayor has just hiked the fine from £130 to £160, and will go further from January next year, raising it to £180. If a driver crosses into Greater London, perhaps unaware of the boundary or unaware of the existence of the charge or that their vehicle is not compliant, they will unknowingly rack up a cripplingly high bill. Potentially as many as 12,000 cars and vans a day may be hit by a fine.

    The RAC estimates that Transport for London could raise £260 million a year by imposing those penalties. To put that into context, Churchill Insurance estimated that the total parking fines raised by every council in the country combined would come to £250 million—£10 million lower than Transport for London would make with those penalties in the first year. TfL could in fact earn significantly more than that, because if not all drivers pay within 14 days—reducing the penalty from £180 to £90—that could raise £390 million every year.

    The Mayor of London has not been a success in office. The Metropolitan police and the London Fire Brigade are both in special measures. Violent crime has reached record highs, and it has not abated. He is not on target to deliver enough affordable homes, despite what he boasted about as being the largest settlement from central Government on record. Crossrail was years late and billions of pounds over budget, with billions more lost in fares that were never raised.

    Stewart Hosie (in the Chair)

    Order. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is about to get back on to low emission zones.

    Gareth Bacon

    Indeed I am. The point I am trying to make is that Sadiq Khan is looking for something he can point to and claim as his. Leaving aside the fact that the ultra low emission zone was not even his idea—it was conceived and the preparatory work was done under my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson)—the Mayor has adopted it as his big idea. The expansion of the ultra low emission zone to outer London has no mandate or popular support. It will do almost nothing for air quality, it will be economically damaging and it will hit the poorest hardest—damaging not just those who live in outer London but millions who live outside Greater London. It is an appalling and unjust policy and it should be scrapped.

  • Gareth Bacon – 2022 Speech in the No Confidence in the Government Motion

    Gareth Bacon – 2022 Speech in the No Confidence in the Government Motion

    The speech made by Gareth Bacon, the Conservative MP for Orpington, in the House of Commons on 18 July 2022.

    I rise to declare my confidence in Her Majesty’s Government. There are myriad substantial reasons for doing so, but I am going to focus on just three, because of the time allowed to me.

    The first, of course, is the ending of the Brexit impasse, which the dead Parliament of 2017 to 2019 showed itself to be incapable of doing. Under the leadership of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, the Conservative party won a landslide victory at the 2019 general election, when I had the privilege of being elected for the first time to represent my constituents in Orpington.

    It is undeniable that a significant reason for the national result was the mandate to deliver on the largest democratic exercise in this country’s history—an exercise that had hitherto been thwarted by arrogant elites, some of whom I see sitting opposite me this evening. On 31 January 2020, Her Majesty’s Government delivered on the will of the people, and we left the European Union. The Labour party claimed that a Conservative Government would not achieve a Brexit trade deal, and yet Her Majesty’s Government announced on 24 December 2020 that Britain and the EU had agreed a post-Brexit trade deal, ending months of disagreement. A clear manifesto commitment that the previous dead Parliament had failed to deliver had been completed within a few weeks of the election. In the months that followed, the Government announced more than 70 trade agreements with countries all around the world.

    That is achievement No. 1, and I will now move to achievement No. 2. Shortly after we left the European Union, the worst pandemic in a century hit the entire world. Her Majesty’s Government put their arms around the people, at great pace and under enormous pressure, and introduced a comprehensive package of support for individuals and businesses. Component parts of the support deal, such as the furlough scheme, saved millions of people from being made redundant when businesses could not trade because of the spread of the virus. Although our economy was on life support, it was kept alive thanks to the actions taken by the Government. As a direct result of decisions taken by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, this country was among the first to begin to emerge from the pandemic.

    Her Majesty’s Government made the right call when it came to the vaccine. Thanks to the Government’s quick action to secure the most promising vaccine doses in advance, more than 120 million doses were administered in the first year in the UK alone. It should be noted, however, that the leader of the Labour party wanted Britain to remain in the European Medicines Agency, which would have delayed the roll-out of the vaccine. Countries in the EMA were much slower with vaccine production and roll-out than the UK was. Had Labour remained in power, the vaccine success that we experienced in this country would not have occurred at anything like the speed it did, with potentially dire consequences.

    Her Majesty’s Government made the right call when it came to reopening the economy last year—something that, of course, the Labour party disagreed with. Time after time, senior Labour figures called for the maintenance, and even an extension, of restrictions. The Leader of the Opposition even said that he would vote for a circuit-breaker lockdown over Christmas, and then days later pretended he had never backed a Christmas restriction. Had he been in power, it would have been less Captain Hindsight, and more Major Catastrophe.

    Finally, this Government and this Prime Minister have led to the west rallying international support for Ukraine. Her Majesty’s Government have kept our country safe. They have led the world in response to the first ground war on the European continent since the second world war, and they have got Brexit done. It is therefore patently obvious that the House should have confidence in Her Majesty’s Government, and I will be supporting the motion.

  • Gareth Bacon – 2021 Speech on Public Landmarks Review

    Gareth Bacon – 2021 Speech on Public Landmarks Review

    The speech made by Gareth Bacon, the Conservative MP for Orpington, in the House of Commons on 18 March 2021.

    Britain is under attack—not in a physical sense, but in a philosophical, ideological and historical sense. Our heritage is under direct assault. There are those who seek to call the very sense of what it is to be British today into question. Attempts are being made to rewrite our history, indoctrinate our children with anti-British propaganda and impose an alternative worldview.

    Our institutions have been undermined. Attempts have been made to sully the reputations of towering figures from British history because the views of their time may not conform to today’s values. The rise of the power, reach and influence of social media in recent years has been highly influential, increasing the pace and spread of what is a broadly left-wing, anti-British, anti-western and anti-capitalist rhetoric. A domino phenomenon is being witnessed as a succession of national institutions and organisations accept, seemingly without question or critical analysis, the new orthodoxy.

    The new orthodoxy has become colloquially known as the woke perspective. In modern day Britain, the woke viewpoint includes attacking the historical concept of Britain by reinterpreting British history in a slanted and decontextualised manner, using modern viewpoints and value judgments. In woke eyes, the British empire is no longer seen as a modernising, civilising force that spread trade, wealth and the rule of law around the globe. Instead, it is viewed as a racist, colonialist, oppressive force than invaded sovereign foreign countries, plundered them and enslaved people en masse.

    Great British heroes such as Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson and Sir Winston Churchill, who were until comparatively recently almost universally regarded in a highly favourable light, now have their reputations besmirched.

    Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this matter to the House. When we record greatness, we celebrate men and women who are inherently imperfect. When I look at Churchill’s statue in Parliament Square, I honour what Churchill represented: duty, fortitude and an unwavering belief that when we British stood together, we could not be defeated. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that these are worthy of celebration and honour today, and that by tearing them down we make no statement other than that we will not acknowledge our past, which makes me fear for our future?

    Gareth Bacon

    I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments. I agree with him unreservedly. I would also like to acknowledge the honour of being intervened on by him. I gather this is a rite of passage for any Member of Parliament: you are not really a Member of Parliament until you have been intervened upon by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), so I am very grateful to him.

    Britain, a small country on the north-western edge of the European continent that led the world in the fields of science, industry, democracy, trade, law, the arts and much more besides, and that stood and fought, often for long periods alone, for freedom against European tyranny in the shape of Napoleon and Nazism and successfully opposed Soviet Communism, is reinterpreted in the woke perspective solely as a slave-owning force of oppression and evil. The slanted views of the woke perspective focus firmly on the past. Its preoccupation is with rewriting that past in order to alter the present. By rewriting Britain’s long and varied history to focus solely on slavery, without any acknowledgement of Britain’s huge role in stamping it out, the woke perspective seeks historical justification for its ideological belief that modern Britain is inherently racist, with an entirely shameful past.

    Marco Longhi (Dudley North) (Con)

    Does my hon. Friend agree that woke activists are of course entitled to their views, and to express them, but that they are not entitled to impose those views as though they were in any way authoritative or unchallengeable? Does he agree that that is an arrogant and divisive standpoint to take?

    Gareth Bacon

    I agree with my hon. Friend. In any mature democracy, the right to hold alternative views and to express them is unchallengeable. However, what I do not think is unchallengeable is an attempt to stamp out contrary views, to cancel people, to bully and intimidate them and to make them fear for their safety simply because they have an alternative view.

    This woke view of our nation’s history fails to recognise the open, tolerant and global Britain that is a force for good in the world—a champion of democracy, equality, peace and prosperity that was forged in the empire. Its mission is to destroy the accepted sense of Britain in order to impose a countervailing ideological perspective, because if it delegitimises the one, it is possible to legitimise the other. Of course, there is no better way to achieve this than to topple the towering heroes on which British history balances. For example, left-wing efforts to paint Churchill as a racist are an attempt to warp our country’s memory of the second world war.

    It is against this backdrop that we see a sudden push from some quarters to question the legitimacy of the statues, monuments and even the road names of certain parts of our country. Chief among them, of course, is London. Our capital city has always been the political, governmental, financial and cultural centre of our country. It therefore has many historic monuments. Unfortunately for London, it also has a Mayor who has never wasted a moment in ingratiating himself with woke activists.

    Within days of the protests in central London last summer, Sadiq Khan announced that he would create a commission for diversity in the public realm. Staggeringly, for a man who constantly pleads poverty when it comes to carrying out his core functions of building houses, running the transport system or keeping people safe on the streets, Sadiq Khan has set aside £1.1 million of taxpayers’ money for this exercise. He claims that the commission is about putting up more monuments of historically significant black and ethnic minority figures and to aid public understanding. This indeed is a worthy aim, but he rather let the cat out of the bag when asked last June whether he thought the commission would lead to statues being removed, and he said, “I hope so.”

    The Mayor’s desire to rewrite history is underlined in the application pack for people aspiring to be on the commission. In it, the Mayor states:

    “Our statues, street names, memorials and buildings have left a distorted view of the past.”

    He goes on to call for the commission to:

    “Further the discussion into what legacies should be celebrated.”

    The terms of reference for the commission stated that there would be:

    “A fair and transparent recruitment process resulting in a group of 15 Commission Members in addition to the two Co-Chairs with broad-ranging knowledge, expertise and lived experience relevant to the work of the Commission.”

    Anyone who takes that at face value is either spectacularly naive or they have not been following the development of Sadiq Khan’s mayoralty.

    In February, the membership of the commission was announced, and it is fair to say that it removed any pretence that it would produce an impartial and objective historical world view. One of the commissioners has already been forced to resign for antisemitic comments he made in the past. Of the remaining commissioners, one has said:

    “The UK is evil. It is the common denominator in atrocities across the world and is responsible for white supremacy everywhere.”

    Another said:

    “Boris Johnson is an out and out complete”—

    he then uses an obscene four-letter word beginning with c —“who is overtly racist.” He goes on to express support for defunding the police. A third claimed last year that:

    “The concept of race was created by white people in order to give them power over non-white people.”

    When setting this commission up, the Mayor claimed:

    “The membership will be representative of London’s diversity.”

    Diversity of what? Certainly not diversity of thought or of political opinion. These people are hand-picked, hard-left political activists. Sadiq Khan is playing an irresponsible and dangerous game by establishing a new commission to tear down London’s landmarks. The Mayor expects this to be an easy, virtue-signalling public relations win, but his decision has created division and inflamed tensions in the capital. A recent poll conducted by YouGov found that 42% of Londoners oppose the plans, compared with 38% who are in favour of them.

    An e-petition calling for the protection of all historical statues and monuments has attracted more than 35,000 signatures of support. Shaun Bailey, Mr Khan’s Conservative opponent in the forthcoming London mayoral election, commented:

    “The Mayor has driven wedges between communities…With his diversity commission, he’s trying to re-write British history, but he does not have the expertise or the authority to do this.”

    He is completely correct.

    One of my constituents wrote to me, and I will quote what he said at length. He said:

    “I originated from Pakistan and my late Father was born in India. I am very concerned about how the identity politics and cancel culture is being promoted. I fully support those who have raised their concerns about Mr Khan’s initiative about changing the names of London roads and dismantling historic statues and monuments.

    There are no other nations or countries which will wipe out or bring disrepute to their empires or Kingdoms and will actively degrade their heroes. History is history and let it not punish our present!”

    He continues:

    “If we study the…British Empire, the British left a huge legacy throughout its vast empire. The British made a chain of Universities and medical colleges, the world’s best irrigation system, it introduced a new structure of administration and introduced democracy in the Subcontinent. It built modern infrastructure including railway tracks, bridges and railway stations. Moreover Britain has welcomed people from North, South, East and West and we must teach patriotism in our schools.”

    Whether we like it or not, there are many very good, some bad and a few ugly elements in Britain’s past, and it is a complicated picture, filled with imperfect heroes. The notion that historical figures should be judged by today’s standards will eliminate every British hero this country holds dear. Will Sadiq Khan topple Churchill for his support for the British empire? Will Admiral Nelson fall for living in a time when slavery existed? Will Sir Francis Drake, Oliver Cromwell, King James II, Lord Kitchener and William Gladstone be erased, and their contributions to British history forgotten, because they were flawed characters? Where do we draw the line? Should Gandhi’s statue be removed because he believed Indians were racially superior to Africans? Will Karl Marx’s tomb be destroyed because of his deeply held antisemitism? Should Egypt’s pyramids and Rome’s colosseum fall because they were built by slaves and those civilisations profited from that abhorrent trade?

    This is why Sadiq Khan was wrong to jump on this latest virtue-signalling bandwagon. His decision to tear down statues in London risks encouraging left-wing mobs to topple statues themselves and far-right mobs to take to the streets to protect them. The events of last summer are proof of that. Instead of posturing in this way, the Mayor should take a long, hard look at his record of failure, which has left communities behind in London. After five years at the helm of City Hall, it is time he took his fair share of responsibility for the challenges and inequities that exist in London today. On his watch: violent crime soared to record levels and murder reached an 11-year high; only 17,000 affordable homes have been completed in five years; 22 major transport upgrades that could regenerate communities have either been delayed or cancelled; and Crossrail is three years late and £4 billion over budget, and Transport for London has lost £2 billion in fares income it would otherwise have accumulated.

    The sad truth is that London is saddled with a Mayor who is not especially interested in the core functions of his role. There is no virtue he will not signal, no passing bandwagon he will not jump on and no gallery he will not play to in his never-ending attempt to ingratiate himself with the latest trend on Twitter. Pandering to woke activists in this way is deeply disturbing. These moves are illegitimate and dangerous. They will do nothing for inclusiveness. Instead, they will foster bitterness and resentment on all sides. We must not go down this route. If the Mayor of London insists on pushing ahead with this deeply divisive, virtue-signalling exercise, the Government should step up to protect our national heritage and explicitly strip him of the power to dismantle it.

  • Gareth Bacon – 2020 Maiden Speech in the House of Commons

    Below is the text of the maiden speech made by Gareth Bacon, the Conservative MP for Orpington, in the House of Commons on 5 February 2020.

    I should like to start by congratulating the hon. Member for Jarrow (Kate Osborne) and my hon. Friends the Members for Keighley (Robbie Moore) and for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) on their excellent contributions to the debate. I must say that I envy them the huge relief that I am sure they must now be feeling. I look forward to feeling it myself in a few minutes’ time.

    I rise to speak as the seventh Member of Parliament to be elected to represent Orpington since the constituency was created in 1945. I follow some distinguished predecessors, who are noteworthy for a variety of reasons. Time does not permit me to talk about all of them, but I will touch on a couple. The first is William Sumner, who represented the seat between 1955 and 1962. The reason that I mention William is that he did something very rare indeed. In order to secure the Conservative nomination, he defeated a young lady called Margaret Thatcher. That defeat led her to resign from the candidates’ list and to temporarily abandon her political ambitions. Fortunately, however, history shows that she recovered reasonably well from the setback. Baroness Thatcher, as she later became, and the values that she championed are what drew me into public life. She made Britain great again, and we on these Benches are the inheritors of her world-shaping legacy.

    I directly follow in some famous footsteps, because my immediate predecessor was Jo Johnson, a man with impeccable family connections. However, he is significantly more than merely the sibling of his famous older brother. He is known for his great intellect, his glittering academic achievements and his distinguished career in journalism. He rose to high office in Government and continues to be highly regarded for having been extremely diligent and hard-working for his constituents. This was shown most clearly by the fact that he quadrupled the majority of slightly under 5,000 that he inherited when he was selected to almost 20,000 at the last election he contested, in 2017. I truly have a tough act to follow.

    The Orpington constituency was included in the boundaries of the newly formed London Borough of Bromley as part of the London Government Act 1963. ​While officially part of Greater London, it is in reality a collection of idyllic villages in the county of Kent. Country lanes, country pubs, village churches and farmers’ fields are spread across great swaths of the area. That is what makes it the best place in the country—contrary to what I heard earlier—to be a Member of Parliament. It is the largest geographical constituency in Greater London, and two thirds of it are rural. The Darwin ward alone is larger than the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.

    Given the rural nature of large parts of the constituency, much of Orpington has not received adequate broadband investment over the years, so the Government’s pledge to roll out full fibre and gigabit-capable broadband to every home and business across the UK by 2025 is especially welcome. I will be pushing for this to be expedited locally as swiftly as possible. Similarly, the rural nature of Orpington means that I have a keen understanding of the huge benefits that open green spaces bring, and any attempt to dilute or remove planning protections for outer London’s green belt would have significantly adverse consequences for my constituents. I will therefore lobby for such attempts to be resisted. The main town centre has a vibrant high street, ably supported by the Orpington 1st business improvement district, and I will always stand up for my local businesses.

    Orpington has had its fair share of famous residents. The aforementioned Darwin ward is named after its most famous resident. Charles Darwin lived in the village of Downe, where he wrote his groundbreaking work, “On the Origin of Species”. Challenging orthodox thinking is not restricted to historical figures, however, as the constituency is home to contemporary figures who have made an impact on public consciousness. By a quirk of fate, that same village has been home to one of my new constituents—a certain Nigel Farage, who, although never a Member of this place, has had an undeniable impact on British and European politics.

    We are fortunate to have some of the best schools in the country, and I am looking forward to visiting those that have kindly invited me to do so. St. Olave’s Grammar School can trace its roots back to 1571 and its long list of notable alumni includes my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp). Its counterpart, Newstead Wood School for girls, has as its most famous alumna the reigning women’s 200-metre world champion, Dina Asher-Smith, who grew up locally and of whom we are extremely proud.

    Orpington has also played its part on the national and international stage, including in the hour of this country’s greatest peril. Biggin Hill airport is now a general aviation airport that caters mostly for private aircraft, but during the second world war it was an RAF base and played a major role in the battle of Britain. Spitfires and Hurricanes from a variety of squadrons were based there, and its fighter pilots destroyed more than 1,400 enemy aircraft. Many of the nearby housing developments are named after those RAF personnel who gave their lives to defend their country. Reading of those pilots’ exploits, and in particular of the age at which so many of them made the ultimate sacrifice, is truly humbling.

    I shall turn now to the business at hand: local government finance. With the fair funding review ongoing, this is an opportune moment to examine that subject, and I speak ​as someone with 22 years of local government experience. The economic shambles left behind by the previous Labour Government in 2010 obliged the incoming coalition Government to make significant reductions in public spending. It is true to say that local government has had to share a considerable portion of that burden, but careful management of the country’s finances over the past decade means that this Conservative Government are now able to address the long-term structural problems that the Blair and Brown Governments created.

    Critically, there is now an opportunity to review historical baseline funding and to recalibrate it, with particular consideration being given to factors such as current population levels and future growth projections. A number of qualitative actions can also be taken, such as conferring greater flexibility on local authorities to raise and spend their own resources, as well as improving business rate retention. Most importantly of all, we need to recognise and reward those local authorities that have delivered high-quality public services while continuing to make efficiencies, such as my own excellent London Borough of Bromley.

    The scale of the Conservative victory in Orpington on 12 December, with more than 63% of the vote, was a ringing endorsement of our campaign to “get Brexit done” so that we could move on to the people’s other priorities. In sending me here to represent them in this place, the people of Orpington have done me the greatest honour of my life. It is a great privilege to be here and I pledge to serve them, and my country, to the best of my ability in the years to come.