Opinions

I, along with 40 other Members of Parliament, am calling for a public apology for, and a public inquiry into, the forced adoptions that took hundreds of thousands of babies from their teenage unmarried mothers in the UK of the 1960s and 1970s. I remember that era well, being a teenager myself at the time, living with the constant terror of pregnancy in those days before the contraceptive pill. We need a public inquiry because this is what I believe it will find.

The past year has been incredibly difficult for us all. Public health fears, economic uncertainty and social isolation created the perfect environment for mental ill health to thrive. Even prior to the pandemic, mental health services were in a perilous state following a decade of underfunding by consecutive Conservative governments. Despite promises of parity of esteem between physical and mental health, the reality was anything but.

As a lifelong Lambeth resident and mum to two young children, I welcome Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN) schemes and am supportive of the objectives that underpin the LTN’s because improving air quality across Lambeth is essential to reduce Lambeth’s air pollution.

Labour had a mixed bag in last week’s elections, losing the Hartlepool MP but gaining five of the seven ‘metro mayors’ including a new term for Sadiq Khan here in London. We appear to have done better where we offer a positive vision for the future, matching people’s aspirations and expectations as we emerge from a national crisis

Under Sadiq Khan, London has made great progress on air pollution. This, in part, has been achieved by the rolling out of the Ultra-Low Emission Zone, schemes to make walking and cycling safer and easier, funding to clean up London’s taxi fleet and almost £53million worth of grants to take older, more polluting vehicles off the roads.

Their Windrush Compensation Scheme has become a scandal in itself, criticised from all corners for its slow speed, complex documentation process and the high burden of proof it places on often elderly victims. Two years since it opened, less than a quarter of those who have applied for compensation have received any, and less than one per cent of the £500million set aside for victims has been paid out

The creative sector has been hit hard over the last year by the consequences of Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic. While I welcomed the Government’s much-touted £1.57billion Cultural Recovery Fund, it was too little too late for some venues, and many creative workers – particularly freelancers – will not benefit from it.

After months of delay, last week finally saw the publication of the report from the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, established by the Prime Minister in July 2020 after the Black Lives Matter movement. From the minute Boris Johnson hired Tony Sewell to be the Chair of the Commission, I suspected the Government might not be serious about addressing racial inequalities.

The Everyone’s Invited campaign was set up last June to campaign against a culture of misogyny, harassment, sexual abuse and sexual assault amongst young people. More than 13,000 people, mainly young women and girls have now anonymously shared their experiences on the campaign’s website.

It has been widely reported that 56,000 people are still living in unsafe blocks, but this only accounts for those buildings using Grenfell-style ACM cladding. Inside Housing has estimated that the true number of people living in potentially dangerous properties is around 600,000

We’ve got the worst of all worlds when it comes to demonstrations during this Covid pandemic. The law is confusing, with some people being angry because they think they don’t have the legal right to demonstrate.