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Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans pledges to deliver on the referendum result and discusses recycling with the Prime Minister’s father Stanley Johnson
British Airways is celebrating 100 years of aviation this year and to mark this milestone they have repainted five of their aircraft in their original livery and I was lucky enough to catch one of them this summer during my holidays. Can you just imagine what the next 100 years will be like?
I suspect that the pub I live next door to in Pendleton, the Swan with Two Necks, will still be winning awards. They have just won the best Camra (real ale) pub in Lancashire. I’ve nothing but huge admiration for this achievement and wish them all the best in the next round of this national competition.
This summer I visited the Henthorn tip and I commend them for their dedication to recycling. There were times when almost everything we discarded would end up as landfill but they are achieving 68 per cent recycling. So, let’s give three cheers to the team working there. The peacocks parading around the skips were wonderful entertainment too!
Staying on the theme of recycling, I recently met our new Prime Minister’s father, Stanley Johnson. I have to say he is such a wonderful personality and quintessentially the perfect Englishman. He is at the forefront of the campaign to ensure our environment is sustainable and he is a huge fan of recycling. I must get him to come to the Ribble Valley and show him that we are doing our bit.
I visited Johnson Matthey on the outskirts of Clitheroe. This is another amazing firm with an eye to the future as they look to reinvest in the area.
They are considering all sorts of new technologies which will change the way that we live. I met the site manager, Stephen Walls, who talked me through past and future investments, which means our area will be at the forefront of these new exciting developments – and it helps to create and secure highly skilled jobs in Lancashire.
I am still working hard talking about all things Brexit and this summer I appeared on the Julia Hartley Breakfast Show ruminating on where this is all going. The truth is that it is incredibly difficult for me to predict with any accuracy where we will be in two months’ time.
It is the most turbulent and unsettled landscape I can ever remember in my 27 years as a Member of Parliament. Politics when you get it wrong ends up with frightening consequences as we see in Hong Kong where there are daily demonstrations.
So, I will be focusing my energies over the next two months on ensuring that we listen more to what our political masters, that is you, the people, are telling us, and ensure we deliver on the environment, safer streets and more police, better public services and delivering on the referendum result. If we fail in these endeavours, we will have failed in our jobs to serve the people and that can never end well either.
Please check out the dates of my summer/autumn tour around the valley on my website. I look forward to meeting you during my visits to all the wonderful villages.
