More Raw Sewage Woes for Sally Ann Hart
PAUL McLAUGHLIN
Local Conservative MP Sally-Ann Hart has been forced to issue an apology on the floor of the House of Commons after incorrectly claiming that Labour’s Jim McMahon, the Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, had not informed her of his visit to Hastings to raise awareness of the dumping of raw sewage into the sea.
According to the Parliamentary convention, MPs intending to visit another constituency should always inform the relevant Member. Under Parliamentary protocol, failing to do so is considered discourteous.
The incident occurred during an Opposition debate last Tuesday (25 April) opened by Mr McMahon, the MP for Oldham West and Royton, which called on the Government “to set a target for the reduction of sewage discharges, to provide for financial penalties in relation to sewage discharges and breaches of monitoring requirements, and to carry out an impact assessment of sewage discharges.”
The Shadow Spokesperson claimed that the dumping of raw sewage into the sea was an “environmental hazard, a health hazard and an economic hazard.” He added that the “full scale of the billions of pounds that the Tory sewage scandal is costing our businesses and local economies is still not fully known. Why? Because the Government will not undertake an economic assessment of the impact of sewage dumping.”
Visit to Hastings
Mr McMahon then referred to a visit he had made to Hastings last September, where, he said, he “met people who are suffering the effects of having contracted hepatitis and Weil’s disease just because they encountered sewage in the open waters.”
At this point, Sally-Ann Hart intervened and called on the Speaker to rebuke the Labour Member as “he never informed me of his visit to Hastings.” Speaker Hoyle chided Mr McMahon telling him: “you must do the right thing and let a Member know that you are entering their constituency.”
The Shadow Secretary of State insisted that “as a matter of course, we always ensure when visiting the constituents of Conservative MPs that as a matter of respect we inform the local MP.” A little later he produced an email which “was acknowledged by Sally Ann Hart’s office at the time” and which confirmed that he had indeed informed them of his visit to the constituency, “when we met our fantastic candidate, Helena Dollimore.”
The Speaker asked Mrs Hart if she wanted to respond, to which she said “no”.
Apology
As her earlier claim was factually incorrect, however, it was incumbent on the MP to put the record straight, otherwise she could have faced a charge of misleading Parliament. When this was pointed out to her, it was a sheepish-looking Mrs Hart who rose to her feet and said she “would like to apologise to the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton. I understand he emailed my office on 7 September last year and received a response.”
In the arcane world of parliamentary convention, the apology was accepted, and the matter was closed – though the dumping of raw sewage into the sea remains a huge political issue and will be a major concern of voters come the next General Election.
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This is becoming a bit of a shock! I’m not used to seeing good investigative journalism from the media. We usually just have to expect toadying to political and corporate masters. But now an article appears in my local independent and free (I mean with no political shackles) news publication, that raises many questions relating to Owens in the old Debenhams store and the provision of vast amounts of public money in the form of GRANTS to the extremely wealthy operators of that establishment. It appears, if I understand it correctly, some of the ‘immersive’ attractions such as the 1066 village complete with sounds, sights and even smells of an ancient Saxon village were to be provided, have now been cancelled. How amazing!
I find it astounding that none of the representatives of our fine town, including our not so very prominent MP, was bothered to even comment let alone question on the financial environment surrounding this enterprise.
Something may be smelling! I dont think it was emanating from a make believe and non existent Saxon village BUT more representative of the Old Town fish market when what remains of our once expansive fleet returns with a particularly good haul.