When I was elected to Parliament in 2005, I received a very kind note of congratulation from Dafydd Wigley. It concluded with the words: “Don’t worry if you keep getting lost; I was there 27 years, and I still kept getting lost.”
Easy enough to get lost in the Palace of Westminster. It’s absolutely vast: 2½ miles of corridors and over 1,000 rooms. And that’s not including Portcullis House, 1 Parliament Street and the rest of the parliamentary estate.
I’m constantly finding new nooks and crannies in this extraordinary building. Today was an example. I needed to table an amendment to the Planning Bill, now the principal focus of my life. I approached the clerks in the Table Office, behind the Speaker’s chair, but was told that I needed to go to the Public Bill Office, which I had never previously visited.
I was directed to a small, slow, creaking lift, which conveyed me laboriously up to the third floor. In this previously uncharted territory, I found the office and discussed my amendment with one of the public bill clerks, whose Rolls-Royce brains ensure that our legislation makes sense (until another Rolls-Royce brain later decides to pull it to pieces it in the courts).
The longer I am in this place, the more I love it. Anyone who works here – in whatever role - should regard it as an absolute privilege. It should never be taken for granted.
Easy enough to get lost in the Palace of Westminster. It’s absolutely vast: 2½ miles of corridors and over 1,000 rooms. And that’s not including Portcullis House, 1 Parliament Street and the rest of the parliamentary estate.
I’m constantly finding new nooks and crannies in this extraordinary building. Today was an example. I needed to table an amendment to the Planning Bill, now the principal focus of my life. I approached the clerks in the Table Office, behind the Speaker’s chair, but was told that I needed to go to the Public Bill Office, which I had never previously visited.
I was directed to a small, slow, creaking lift, which conveyed me laboriously up to the third floor. In this previously uncharted territory, I found the office and discussed my amendment with one of the public bill clerks, whose Rolls-Royce brains ensure that our legislation makes sense (until another Rolls-Royce brain later decides to pull it to pieces it in the courts).
The longer I am in this place, the more I love it. Anyone who works here – in whatever role - should regard it as an absolute privilege. It should never be taken for granted.
