Natalie Fleet MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 17 Dec 2025 · Palliative Care: North Derbyshire · Hansard source

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  I have received so many emails from really concerned constituents about this issue. There was one that stuck out: it was from a serving member of the armed forces, who wrote to me about her elderly mother who recently passed away at Ashgate. She was stationed abroad, but flew home to be with her mum, and was able to spend five days and nights with her—her mother’s last moments. Does my hon. Friend agree that we should all be extremely thankful for the high-quality care that Ashgate hospice gives to our constituents and others, and that we should all be concerned about the reduction in beds and the loss of jobs?

• 16 Dec 2025 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  T3. I want to raise the case of my constituent from Pinxton. They were awarded a substantial amount of money at an employment tribunal over two years ago for unpaid wages. They have not been able to track down the company since then—it is using a shell address and is not responding to any correspondence. My constituent has paid a private company to try to find the company, but it has got nowhere. It has been two years of hardship and mental health issues, so will the Secretary of State outline what steps are being taken to make sure hard-working people get the money that is owed to them?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer · Hansard source

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  Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

• 10 Dec 2025 · Conduct of the Chancellor of the Exchequer · Hansard source

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  I welcome the debate and I thank the shadow Chancellor for giving way on the point about women. We are here to talk about the conduct of the most powerful woman in this country, who used her Budget to remove the rape clause, to take children out of poverty and to give justice to miners in my patch. That never would have happened without her. I welcome this moment to celebrate our Chancellor, and I thank the right hon. Gentleman for it.

• 20 Nov 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  The food hygiene rating scheme means that we can celebrate five-star venues, like Alleppey Kitchen my constituency, and we can all avoid the ones with one star, if we choose. Councillor David Bennett from Clowne is running a campaign to make it mandatory to display those ratings in England, just as it is in Wales and Northern Ireland. Will the Leader of the House consider granting a debate in Government time to allow us to discuss that?

• 20 Nov 2025 · Migration: Settlement Pathway · Hansard source

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  In 2024, in the run-up to the election, I knocked on door after door where people told me that they were absolutely sick of our broken immigration system that we inherited from the Tories. They did not trust Reform, who are not here today, to tackle it. I welcome the intervention from our Home Secretary. Does she agree that to be the open, tolerant and generous country that we know we are, we must get order and control at our borders?

• 20 Nov 2025 · International Men’s Day · Hansard source

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  I am thrilled to be here to celebrate the incredible men among us, including my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Josh Newbury). I thank him for sharing his story. Men need to be celebrated today—those who pick up the pieces, make our lives better by being in them and provide positive role models to our children. I want to speak about the most undervalued man in my life, my husband Ritchie Fleet. In March, it will be 25 years since we met, with me at 16 with a newborn and him ready to step up into a role that he chose and which he has absolutely smashed. He makes me feel supported and loved, and I am proud to see him growing from a caring and present father to an incredible grandad. I cannot wait to see his adventures with our granddaughter as he drops his hours to take on his share of her childcare. There is breaking news, Madam Deputy Speaker: all the toilet seats have been stolen from Scotland Yard, but police say they have got nothing to go on. Everyone loves a dad joke, but we cannot let paternity leave be the real joke. How we see it is really important. It is an important class issue, with 90% of paternity leave taken by the 50% of top earners, and dads in my area less likely to take paternity leave than those who live in London. The men’s health strategy, which I am thrilled that we are introducing, is right to identify that flexible working and sufficient paternity leave positively impact a father’s health, relationship with their partner and involvement with their child. When we get it right, it is not just better for men but better for women and children. I was honoured to be at the first ever International Men’s Day celebration in Downing Street last night. I could take a guest, and there were so many to choose from in my constituency, including: Kyle Barnes in Langwith, who set up a football team for his daughter; Andrew Joesbury in South Normanton, who spends so much time volunteering at the school; and Tony Mellors in Newton, who wants to ensure that our area’s history is passed on to the next generation. But the man I took was Paul Oxborough from Holmewood. Paul’s friend Dale Caffrey was a man we lost too soon. Suicide remains the biggest killer of men under 50, and the destruction left behind is immeasurable. Paul set up Mental Health Motorbike with Dale’s wife and best friend, which is a mental health charity that provides free online and face-to-face support. In five years, the charity has grown to 100 volunteers and is holding over 400 events this year, taking mental health peer support to the biker community across the UK. I am thrilled to have that national charity established in my constituency by that incredible bloke. As I saw Paul speaking to the Prime Minister last night about all that the charity has achieved, I thought about the suicides that could be prevented. There is so much to celebrate today, but there is also so much more to do. Let us show our boys that real courage is talking about men’s mental health. Strength comes from opening up when you need to. Let us make it normal that proper, brave men talk about how they feel. I will finish with the words of my friend Tracey about her late husband Kurt Hayes-Bradley: one life lost is one too many; each life saved is a blessing. It is definitely time to talk.

• 13 Nov 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Special educational needs families in Bolsover and across Derbyshire are let down by our dire education services that were ripped to ruin by the Tories and are now being failed by Reform. I met families earlier this year and heard heartbreaking stories of how they and their babies are being let down. It was horrendous. They are being ignored by the Reform council: letters are not being responded to and cases are not being progressed. Children are out of education as a result. Does the Leader of the House agree with me that Reform Derbyshire county council must improve its special educational needs services and deliver for children across Derbyshire?

• 11 Nov 2025 · Sixth-form Provision: Bolsover · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. Students are less likely to get A-levels in Bolsover than in any other part of Derbyshire. Some students do really well in their GCSEs and go on to a really good sixth form in Chesterfield, but it is more than 10 miles away. They have to get two buses: one to Chesterfield town centre and one to the Newbold area. The sixth form has a private bus, but it is £1,000 a year and takes about 50 minutes each way. That puts the school out of reach for students whose families cannot afford the travel, and the long travel times do nothing to encourage anyone to go there. I want to talk about two brothers who recently left The Bolsover school and started at the nearest sixth form. Both dropped out in the first year because of the cost of the bus. One of the brothers tried to run the five-and-a-bit miles to sixth form and back every day, but with a bag full of books, and winter weather and darkness, he could not sustain it. They have both dropped out of their level 3 studies, and we believe they are no longer in education at all. When we fail our children, there are lifelong consequences. Not having a sixth form is a large part of why only a quarter of 18-year-olds in Bolsover enrol at university, compared with the UK average of 36%. It is why, on education, skills and training measures, Bolsover is the 99th most deprived constituency in the country. It is also why people’s wages in Bolsover are £100 less per week than the UK average. Having less money and less education affects people’s ability to live long and healthy lives. A quarter of our residents only have GCSEs, but a quarter have no qualifications at all. On every measure I have looked at, Bolsover could and should be doing better. We have to give people the same opportunities that children living in larger towns and cities take for granted. The young people I see when I visit their schools blow me away. On a recent visit to Shirebrook academy, they told me that they did not want to be called disadvantaged because it is another label that holds them back. Instead, they are funny, they are polite, they are smart—and my God, they are full of potential. They make me so happy just being around them. Ridiculously, they treat me like I am a big deal. It is them who are the biggest of deals. It is our job as a Government to put a world of opportunity in front of them, just like the last Labour Government did for me. I grew up seeing more people I know going to prison than to university. I was really lucky to have a Government with the slogan, “Education, education, education”—a Government determined to be ambitious for me before I even knew what ambition was. The Labour Government gave me opportunity that I never expected to need and smashed down barriers that I could not have anticipated. Instead of writing me off as a young mum, they paid for childcare for my newborn, meaning that I could drop her off at nursery and take the short bus ride to West Notts college. They invested in brilliant education that I will forever be grateful for and supported me to get the grades that meant I could go to university with my second baby on the way. The first time I visited The Bolsover school, I asked where the teenage mums were, and I was told that they did not have them. I panicked, because I worried that teenage mums were being excluded from education. Instead, I was told that they did not exist, at least not in the same way that they used to, because the same Government who had supported me had also implemented a teenage pregnancy strategy. That strategy meant that my area, which had the highest teenage pregnancy rates in Europe when I had my baby, saw the biggest issue facing us and tackled it. That is incredible. I am here to make sure that we leave an equally impactful legacy for the next generation. We must give Bolsover’s young people access to quality education in our area. I promise that I am not just being a difficult woman. In the last 12 hours, I have received well over 100 emails, messages and comments on this issue from parents, former pupils, current pupils and teachers who live in the area—anyone with a connection to the school, young people and education. They are desperate for this sixth form to go ahead. Sky, a former Bolsover student, said: “I finished Bolsover School in 2023 and had to move to another Sixth Form, but I didn’t think it was worth the experience. The education felt like a downgrade—if Bolsover School had a Sixth Form, I would have stayed and had a better experience, like I did in my secondary years.” Alysha, another former Bolsover student, said: “After my GCSEs, I would have loved to continue my studies somewhere familiar and local. I now travel over an hour each day to Sixth Form, but if Bolsover had one, I’d have stayed. I hope future children can have that chance”. Parents of young children are already looking for the best option for their child to gain a higher level of qualification, and they know that a local sixth form would help them to achieve those goals. Victoria, a Bolsover mum, said: “My daughter is a hardworking and bright child in year 8 at The Bolsover School. Her dreams and ambitions should not be cut short because Bolsover is deemed not to be worthy of such a basic requirement, the investment in education, by some.” Another mum said: “My oldest son is currently in year 10, he’s a high achieving pupil predicted 8-9 grades in all subjects. He does however have severe anxiety, particularly social anxiety. If he needs to get a bus to school for sixth form, he simply won’t go.” Other parents of children with special educational needs have echoed this sentiment, telling me that their children need the supportive and structured environment of a sixth form at the school they know and are familiar with in order to continue their education. However, this is not just an issue for SEND parents. A teacher from my area told me that many students feel daunted by travelling to a big college and often give up on their ambitions because there is no local option. That teacher said that a sixth form in Bolsover would be transformational: inspiring young people, raising aspirations and showing them that their community believes in their potential. Parents can see that the playing field is not level and that their children have an undeserved disadvantage because of where they live. One dad, Sammie, wrote: “The difference to growing up on the outskirts of Nottingham 20 years ago to living in Bolsover today is quite scary. The opportunities around Bolsover for young people to grow and develop are dire.” Another dad, who has two children, said: “The sixth form would raise aspirations, build on the strengths of one of the best schools in the area and ensure our children have the best educational start in life, so they can help contribute to the financial and economic prosperity of our district for generations to come.” That is key. If Bolsover people are already leaving the area to get their A-levels, they are more likely to move away to pursue a career, and a cycle of low attainment and low aspiration continues for those who are left. As a child of the last Labour Government, I am determined to deliver for the children of this Labour Government. I hope I have shown that what I speak of today is really personal to me. However, this is not just about me; I have a community behind me, and they are desperate for this to happen. This is important, and this is why politics matters. I leave that very special community and my family behind every week to be here because I cannot let it be only me who benefits from the last Labour Government’s investment in my education. I want these children—the children of this Labour Government—to benefit in the same way. I am thrilled to see us smashing down barriers to opportunity, making sure that no child is ever too hungry to learn and that our little ones are ready for school on that special first day. I have an extra ask of the Government, on behalf of the young people of Bolsover. Let us show these incredible children that we will not leave them behind any longer. I ask that we get spades in the ground and open the doors of North Derbyshire university academy.

• 11 Nov 2025 · Sixth-form Provision: Bolsover · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That this House has considered sixth form provision in Bolsover constituency. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Butler. Residents of Bolsover must feel like they have déjà vu. My predecessor, Mark Fletcher, first raised the need for a sixth form in Bolsover in Parliament on 2 March 2020. On 7 March 2023, he spoke in this very Chamber about the need for Bolsover to have its own sixth form. On 6 September 2023, the then Prime Minister congratulated Mark on getting a sixth form. So the question that residents rightly ask is: why are we here today? Why have I raised this issue in Parliament five times in the past year? Why have I met Ministers and the Education Secretary to make representations? Why are Andrew Burns, the chief executive officer of Redhill Academy Trust, and Richard Pierpoint, the regional director, here with us to see this debate today? As one resident succinctly put it, getting the promise is one thing, but making sure that that promise is delivered is another thing entirely. Despite Mark’s determined campaign and the tireless work of The Bolsover school executive headteacher Matt Hall, who sadly cannot be with us today because he has an Ofsted inspection, the previous Government’s promises have not been delivered. Although I wish I was here congratulating Mark as new pupils enter North Derbyshire university academy, I saw as soon as I was elected that I needed to take up the baton. I will not rest until the young people of Bolsover, Clowne, Shirebrook, Creswell and the surrounding villages have the sixth form that they so desperately need. Why is this so important? For far too many of our young people, Bolsover today is a story of unfilled potential. Bolsover covers a huge area, from Pinxton to Whitwell, Shirebrook to Wessington, yet there is no sixth form. When it comes to barriers to opportunity, surely one of the biggest is that the closest sixth form is a 30-minute bus ride away at a cost of £25 a week. The inability to access any form of education past the age of 16 without getting on one or two buses and travelling for up to an hour is why so few teenagers attend a school sixth form—only 25% from The Bolsover school, 13% from Heritage high school in Clowne and just 8% from Shirebrook academy do so. For those who live anywhere else in the country, the average figure is three times higher than for Shirebrook.

• 27 Oct 2025 · Victims and Courts Bill · Hansard source

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  I will speak to Government new clause 14. It means that rapists will no longer have access to children conceived by their crime. It puts the right of survivors above the rights of criminals. It protects mummies and their precious babies. It is not okay that it took so long for the law to change—to keep up with common sense—but to get this change the Government fought to get us on these Benches and into government, bringing with us our real-life experience and that of our community, supported by Ministers, right up to the Prime Minister, determined to tackle violence against women and girls.

• 21 Oct 2025 · Rape Gangs: National Statutory Inquiry · Hansard source

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  Today, the Government have announced that they will take parental responsibility away where a child is born of rape. That will protect grooming victims. Children in this country will no longer be the only proceed of crime that criminals can have lifelong access to. Does the Minister agree that survivors were failed for too long by a Conservative Government who did not prioritise giving them justice? That party is led by the Leader of the Opposition, who did not mention grooming when she had the power to do something about it. Instead, survivors have had to wait for victims and activists to be on the Government Benches, and for the fiercest of advocates to be at the Dispatch Box.

• 16 Oct 2025 · Ada Lovelace Day · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. Ada Lovelace’s legacy is absolutely stellar, as everybody points out. I have the slightest link because I was lucky enough to get married in Newstead abbey, her father’s ancestral home—we all want a piece of Ada. Hers is a name that people recognise and her contribution is rightly credited. What concerns me is that the Lovelace report found that “80% of women surveyed have recently left or are interested in leaving their tech roles”. As has already been touched on, if you can’t see it, you can’t be it. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is an absolute travesty that only 20% of people in tech are women, and that we have to work to combat that?

• 21 Jul 2025 · Post-16 Education: Skills · Hansard source

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  I was recently lucky enough to visit Brigg infant school in South Normanton. It is a gorgeous school full of talented pupils and dedicated staff, but it has a problem: four and five-year-olds are being taught in a prefab building that is not fit for purpose. I love to see the way that we invest in education, but these children have been let down by the previous Government. Does the Minister agree that they deserve a classroom that is fit to be taught in, and will she look at this case?

• 16 Jul 2025 · Further Education Institutions · Hansard source

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  My constituency is one of 15 in the whole of England that does not have a sixth-form college or a further education college. That has huge repercussions for local young people and their potential. I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate and sharing her point on the impact on social mobility. I have been campaigning for a sixth-form college at the Bolsover school site since I was elected, after the last Government offered the sixth form but left no funds to pay for it. Does my hon. Friend agree that areas such as mine must be the priority for Government support for a sixth form?

• 11 Jun 2025 · British Coal Staff Superannuation Scheme · Hansard source

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  When we speak of the mineworkers’ pension, we speak of everyone who has sustained our pits, such as my constituents Anthony Peck, who joined the scheme aged 17, and Kevin Jowle, automatically enrolled when he became a deputy, without any consultation. Does the Minister agree that everyone deserves a fair pension and compensation for the £3.2 billion that the Treasury has received to date?

• 4 Jun 2025 · Engagements · Hansard source

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  The first constituent to reach out to me was a brave Bolsover mummy who had waited four years and five months, from rape to prosecution, with three postponements and multiple suicide attempts. I will do everything I can to use this Chamber to speak out for women who are being so badly let down. How will the Prime Minister support me to ensure that when these survivors—these formidable women—across the country come forward, they will get justice and there will be space in our prisons for the perpetrators?

• 20 May 2025 · Victims and Courts Bill · Hansard source

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  I declare an interest as a member of the Women and Equalities Committee. Rape survivors are too often hidden in plain sight. In Bolsover, my constituency, 10,554 women will have been raped or sexually assaulted since they were 16—a third in their own homes—in Shirebrook, Tibshelf, Wessington, Barlborough and every village and town in between, and 5,277 of them will have been raped more than once; 880 will have reported it, and if we are lucky, 26 will have seen a charge brought. I have permission to share the experience of one of the wonderful constituents who reached out to me. She said, “I was spiked in a hotel and sexually assaulted in my room where I thought I would be safe.” As a result, she says, “I lost my job, my marriage nearly crumbled and I lost six of my son’s most formative years because my brain shut down completely…and I went into survival mode.” She continues: “We need to raise our boys better, to respect and work alongside women without judgement or expectations around sex”. She is right, but this is not just a Bolsover problem; this is a society issue. Rape is a part of our national story—a part that we are not telling—and we cannot continue with a culture where he did it and she hid it. Women do not report because they have been let down by the courts for too long. That was the case for another of my constituents, who went four years and five months from rape to trial, with multiple suicide attempts. I am so pleased that this Government are doing something about this, and are treating violence against women and girls as the national emergency that it is. The measures in this Bill mean that victims of crime will finally be put first. The Bill is also our opportunity to put a full stop to a lifetime of ongoing trauma. I will keep speaking about the 10 babies born every day to their mummies who have been raped—six children in my constituency every year, and in every constituency across England and Wales. We see those children hidden in plain sight on our school visits; we see them as adults in the workplace; they drink among us in the pub. But their brave mothers have hidden the story behind their existence throughout history—often even from them. The mums tell me about the struggle to bond with a baby who looks like the man who hurt them. They tell me about the pain of loving their children and also wishing that they did not exist. They tell me about living with the threat of their rapist being part of their life forever. One survivor said that she could not report the crime because the perpetrator had parental responsibility, and told her that he would use it if she reported it. Being charged, going to prison—nothing would take away his rights around the child who was conceived when he raped her. This Bill is our opportunity to change that. I call on our Government to remove parental responsibility where a child is conceived via rape. Our precious children can no longer be the only proceed of crime to which a criminal has lifelong access.

• 7 May 2025 · Educational Opportunities in Semi-rural Areas · Hansard source

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  Bolsover is one of only 15 constituencies in the whole of England to be without a sixth form. Our incredible and inspiring young people live in small towns and villages, and they have to rely either on parents to give them a lift or on barely existent public transport. One village, Morton, has just had its bus service cancelled, cutting it off entirely. Residents tell me that it is now impossible for young people to get to Chesterfield college. The lack of a sixth form, combined with poor transport, means that far too many do not attend sixth form at all. In places such as Shirebrook, 7% of young people do A-levels, compared with 52% nationally. Across our constituency, fewer than one in four 18-year-olds go to university, and fewer than one in five have a degree—half the national average. The lack of sixth form provision is undoubtedly one of the main drivers of low aspiration and academic achievement. It sets our young people on a path to deprivation, poverty and poor health. It limits their earning potential and their opportunities in their professional and personal lives. Bolsover has plans for a new sixth form, which the Department for Education, wonderfully, is considering. Access to further and higher education is essential to removing a preventable barrier to our incredible young people achieving their ambition. I call on the Minister to prioritise our young people, just like the last Labour Government prioritised my education, which meant that I could be here today. I want us to smash down barriers to opportunity and approve Bolsover sixth form.

• 7 Apr 2025 · East Midlands: Local Authorities and Economic Growth · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Gedling (Michael Payne) for securing this debate. I can assure him that potholes are as bad in Conservative-run Derbyshire as they are in Nottinghamshire. Our area has been shut out of the conversation around economic growth for too long. I am excited to see the change with a Labour East Midlands Mayor and a Labour Government, who recently confirmed £15 million for Bolsover district council. That will see eight projects delivered to boost business and tourism across Pinxton, Shirebrook and Bolsover. However, one area desperately needs investment so that we can unlock our economic potential: transport. Some 80% of residents in Bolsover live in transport-related social exclusion. That compares with 18% of residents across England. It is the second-highest figure in the whole country. From South Normanton to Barlborough, transport issues affect growth and have a huge impact on everyday life. People in Clowne are desperate for a bus to Chesterfield royal hospital. Just last week, Morton was cut off completely from public transport after its bus was first cancelled and then reinstated, but with Morton taken off the route. How can people get to work if there is no bus service to take them? How do parents get their little ones to childcare? Why would a business invest in areas where people cannot get to their employer? Who is to blame? Derbyshire county council must take responsibility. The Conservative-run council has a bus service improvement plan, but buses continue to fail residents across Bolsover. Bus services are reduced, villages are cut off and buses are either late or do not turn up at all. Rural communities rely on buses for growth, for work and for leisure. Conservative Derbyshire county council are letting us down. Bolsover deserves better and I urge anyone who agrees to make that known at the ballot box on 1 May.

• 2 Apr 2025 · Non-disclosure Agreements · Hansard source

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  We have no idea how many people in Bolsover this issue affects, because the very nature of it means that they cannot speak to me about it as their MP. The Can’t Buy My Silence campaign has found that the issue affects five times as many women as men, so does my right hon. Friend agree that addressing it has to be considered as essential to tackling violence against women and girls?

• 6 Mar 2025 · International Women’s Day · Hansard source

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  Women are over-represented in informal and vulnerable employment. Does my hon. Friend agree that the protections afforded in the Employment Rights Bill are really important for those women?

• 6 Mar 2025 · International Women’s Day · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to be here today as the first MP to represent Bolsover who is a woman. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] Thank you. I am surrounded by fantastic women not only here, but in Bolsover—women who run businesses and nurture our next generation, such as foster carer Sonja Dayson in Creswell, women who inspire us as community leaders, such as Helen Marriott of Pinxton scouts, with nearly four decades of dedication, and women who support charities to thrive and fight to make a difference with tenacity, like Edwina Cant of Bolsover Woodlands Enterprise. I will spend this week celebrating them all and more. Today I want to talk about the hidden issues that affect us women—too often our private burden. If we look at the last Parliament, the BBC was discussed more often than childcare. Fishing was five times more likely to be mentioned than menopause. This historic House, which women died to get us into, spent more time discussing football than rape. My daughter—she is brave and wonderful—tells me, “Mum, every time you talk about rape, every time you say the word, I bristle. Please do not stop.” My baby—my little baby—is about to start big school. The data tells me that while she is there, she will witness sexual harassment and potentially be sent dick pics, and there is nothing that I can do to protect her from that. This is not a class or age thing; it does not matter how far we go back. It is an accepted part of the story of Mary Queen of Scots that the nobles chose among themselves who was going to rape her with the intention of impregnating her. Yet we still do not accept that that happens in the UK. Ten births happen every day from rape. There is no charity to support those women and no advice on the NHS website. The men can access those children at any time they like. Every single one of us has either been raped or knows someone who has been raped. Rape is a part of our story as women, yet it is a part that we do not tell. I want to tell you about rape and being an MP. Rape threats are an accepted part of the job. I thank the Minister for speaking up about this disgusting truth. I am the 690th woman MP. Rape Crisis estimates that a quarter of women have been raped or sexually assaulted. If we apply that data to MPs, that means that 172 of us have been raped, and half of them—86 woman MPs—will have been raped more than once. Statistically, 28 of them will have reported it. Given a miracle, or on an optimistic day, one could have led to a conviction—at the very best.

• 6 Mar 2025 · International Women’s Day · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. I am proud to be part of a Government who have set out an unprecedented ambition to halve violence against women and girls, but what I want us to think about on this day is how we tell our story. I have spoken publicly about giving birth after being the victim of statutory rape, and I am sick of being told I am brave. I do not want to be brave; I want it to be expected that we tell our truth. Courage calls to courage everywhere. Let us make it normal to talk about rape—in workplaces, in kitchens, with friends. Instead of bristling, let us talk about it like we talk about football; let us talk to our boys about consent and celebrate the men who are our allies. Most importantly, listen to her, support her and, for God’s sake, believe her. If you are one of the colleagues, friends or constituents who have told me about your rape, I ask you to tell each other. You will be surprised how many people believe you and then share their story with you, too. I am the very proud nana of a beautiful granddaughter. She is four weeks old and named after one of the suffragettes who helped me to get here today. I genuinely believe that if we are brave now and make speaking out the norm, we can have a world in which she tells her grandchildren about the fact that they did it and we hid it. I want that to be the part that her grandchildren do not believe. There is a lot to do and it can feel overwhelming, but let us put our arms around each other and use our power to force that shame to change sides.

• 12 Feb 2025 · SEND Provision: Derbyshire · Hansard source

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  Special educational needs provision across Derbyshire is dire. I am thrilled that my hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Linsey Farnsworth) has secured the debate, but I am horrified that special educational needs provision is so awful that it has come to the attention of Parliament. To those who live in Barlborough, Pinxton, Calow, Pleasley or anywhere in between, that is no surprise. A mum from Shirebrook was in tears on the doorstep because her baby had been let down so badly; a teaching assistant in Creswell told me how overwhelmed she was because the demand for resource was so high and the resource available so low; and a little boy in Clowne is self-harming because he just wants to go to school like all his friends. All those people knew why things were as bad as this. I did not have to tell them. Sixteen million pounds underspent by Conservative-controlled Derbyshire county council: they repeated that to me time and again. This was never about lack of money; it was always about local Conservatives choosing to fail our young people. Bolsover residents knew that the Conservatives at Derbyshire county council had £16 million with which to support them and their little ones, and chose not to spend it. It is therefore no surprise that Ofsted found widespread and systemic failings, with families waiting too long and feeling ignored, and children missing large amounts of education. Conservative failure has hit Bolsover very hard. One in six pupils there receive SEN support, and far more need it. When I met heads from across Bolsover last year, special educational needs failure was the first issue that they raised. One school had 200 students on the SEND register, but had to park those who did not qualify for additional provision because it did not have the capacity to give those children what they needed. Another had five children who needed a special needs school place but had been unable to obtain one, with one of those children remaining in the nursery class for several years as a result. A local family moved to Bolsover from Essex, bringing their autistic son’s EHCP with them. Conservative-controlled Derbyshire County Council lost the paperwork. It does not respond to emails and it does not respond to my staff. The six schools consulted said that they could not accommodate the child because they already had too many SEN children on their registers. They do not have enough staff, and they do not have enough resources, so that child has no school place. He has not been at school during the current academic year, and has no tutor allocated. His parents are doing what they can to ensure that he does not fall behind. His mother has turned down two jobs to stay at home and educate him. The parents are angry and frustrated with the council’s lack of communication or concern for their child’s education. Every one of those stories is a personal tragedy for the people involved. Childhoods are being lost. Family finances are put under strain. Relationships are breaking down. In a battle to help special educational needs children to reach their potential, parents and teachers are hitting a brick wall. A headteacher told me that they thought the Conservative county council saw them as the enemy. When those who care for our babies are made to feel like that, how can our children’s special educational needs ever be met? Be under no illusion: politics does matter. This is the best example of the difference it makes to all our lives. For Bolsover residents—for Derbyshire residents—this is the negative impact that politics can have. Our children are being failed by Conservative politicians at Derbyshire county council with a £16 million underspend, long waiting lists, failed Ofsted inspections, schools drowning, kids suffering, families in crisis. The Conservatives have had their chance, and they have failed. The only way to change this is for Labour to win control of the county council in May. A Labour Government backed by a Labour county council is our only chance of seeing real improvement in special educational needs provision for Bolsover and beyond.