November 2005 Archives

I wanted to bring to your attention the new Hear From Your MP web site. The idea behind it is very simple. You give them your name, email address and postcode and they add you to a list of people who are interested in hearing from your local MP. When there are 30 people on that list they send your MP an email saying "30 people in your constituency would like to hear from you". The MP can then use the site to send a message back to those people. If the MP does not respond then they get another email as the number of sign-up constituents reaches 50, 100 and higher numbers.

As I write this, 32 people have signed up in Battersea and Martin Linton has yet to respond.

Please add your name to the list.

It seems that the Strangers' Bar in the Houses of Parliament has changed the range of beers that it offers and this change means that it no longer serves Youngs beers. As the Youngs Brewery is in his constituency, Martin Linton felt compelled to raise this issue with the leader of the house.

The Guardian enjoed this story so much that they ran it twice - both in the newspaper and also on their news blog.

The official web site is still sporting a minimal front page, several months after a new site was promised.

We understand that Martin Linton's staff are very busy on a number of other projects, so we're happy to repeat our offer to help out with the project in any way that we can.

Martin Linton asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department how many Somalian nationals have claimed asylum at Heathrow arriving on flights from (a) Nairobi and (b) Addis Ababa in the last five years.

Andy Burnham replied that 58 Somalian nationals had claimed asylum when arriving at Heathrow from Nairobi over the last five years and 44 had done it when arriving from Addis Ababa over the same period.

Read the full exchange at TheyWorkForYou.

The Press Gazette has a story about a group of MPs who were campaigning to allow television to show MPs "in the main committee corridor, where much of the offstage political drama at Westminster takes place". This proposal has been rejected by the government.

The group of MPs propsing this change included Martin Linton who is quted as saying:

There should be a relaxation of the rules of filming around the precincts of Parliament.

People are not allowed to take still photographs, which means that many newspapers refuse to use grainy pictures taken from the television monitor and end up using nothing at all.

Read the full story.

Martin Linton asked Alistair Darling if he had considered a London orbital network that could join the north, south, east and west London lines and enable commuters to avoid the centre of London, unlike Thameslink.

Alistair Darling replied that he was always willing to look at proposals, but that he would not want to raise false hopes. He pointed out that funding would be the limiting factor.

Read the full exchange at TheyWorkForYou.

Martin Linton asked Andy Burnham what the average length of time is now for an initial decision on asylum cases and the time that it takes for removal, pointing out that previously people had come to his surgery who had been waiting seven or eight years for an initial interview.

Andy Burnham replied that when the Government first came to power the average time that a case took to be processed was two years but that now the majority of cases were handled in two months.

Read the full exchange at TheyWorkForYou.

Martin Linton clarified comments made by Nick Harvey about the Welsh Assembly's communications department.

Read the full exchange at TheyWorkForYou.

Martin Linton spoke in this debate giving reasons why he felt that that number of days that a suspect can be held without charge needed to be increased.

Read his full speech at TheyWorkForYou.