This varied week I went in Westminster from private discussions with Ministers of the Spending Review, the latest planning reforms, and the availability of IVF in Somerset for service personnel; to meetings with fellow Somerset MPs and the Somerset Clinical Commissioning Group on the integration of health and social care and other local health challenges; to responding to large volumes of correspondence and specific casework for constituents; to voting each day on government business; and then on Friday to speaking on two important Private Members' Bills on the floor of the House of Commons, before high tailing it back to Somerset to attend St Mary's Chard Autumn Fair on Saturday and Yeovil and Ilminster Remembrance activities on Sunday.
Private Members' Bills are ideas for legislation introduced by individual Members of Parliament rather than the Government. Only an MP chosen by random ballot at the beginning of the Parliament can propose such a Bill, and the time set aside for progressing some of them through the system for approving legislation is on Fridays. Only a couple of dozen are drawn from the ballot of over 600 MPs, so my colleague Wendy Morton, another new MP, was lucky to be chosen first time round, and have her Bill come forward first on Friday.
Typically each Friday only has enough time to discuss two Private Members Bills, at a pinch, and Wendy's, up first and having the support of the Government, after a few hours of debate was voted through to the next stage: consideration in committee.
I was pleased to speak in support of its measures to give NHS charities more independence, and mention the excellent work done by our local Yeovil Hospital charity, and its Flying Colours appeal. The Yeovil charity could benefit from the extra flexibility allowed under this Bill. And Great Ormond Street children's hospital charity will certainly be helped to benefit the many children and families from all over the country who come to Great Ormond Steeet for cutting edge treatment. Not only will the Bill allow it more flexibility, it will properly confer across to the benefit of the very valuable copyright of Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie, bequeathed to the Hospital for Sick Children as it then was by Barrie, and extended in perpetuity in 1987. Very appropriate as we approach pantomime season.
I was the main Conservative speaker in support of the second Bill, on which debate needed to be concluded by 2.30pm if a vote was to be allowed, and therefore the possibility for the Bill to be progressed to the next stage. This is a where Parliamentary procedure becomes a bit arcane and technical, but essentially, if the government doesn't support a Private Member's Bill, it may try to "talk out" the Bill, otherwise known as "filibuster", to prolong the debate past the point at which a vote can be held during the day on moving the Bill to the next stage.
The second Bill looked to require the Government to seek licences for established new uses for off patent drugs, to encourage wider prescribing of useful treatments for cancer, MS and Parkinson's, for example. While the Government didn't allow this particular Bill through on Friday, it is working on an alternative to achieve the same aim of wider prescribing, and I will certainly keep the pressure on to get an effective outcome ASAP.
Parliament's debates can be watched back or live, on the BBC Parliament channel, or at www.parliament.tv