It’s been a political few weeks, and I’ll come to that in a moment. The non-political highlight of the last fortnight was my visit to Stonehenge, which annoyingly is a few hundred yards outside my constituency. I shouldn’t be jealous. The stones themselves are ours, dragged 30 miles from some woods near Marlborough (the big sarsens of the outer ring, I mean - it’s the little bluestones in the middle that come from Wales). And anyway (as I said in my maiden speech) northern Wiltshire looks down on Stonehenge from a height of 1000 years, which is how much older the larger, greater, and generally classier (just not so tall) stone circle at Avebury is than the Welsh-Wilts pastiche on the A303.
All this aside, I was very excited to be visiting the stones properly, as I’ve never been closer than the main road. English Heritage’s Director of Stonehenge, Nichola Tasker, and one of her team showed me round. I will not attempt to do justice to the solemn mystery of the ‘monument field’, as it’s called, or the eerie sense you get realising this is just one of many neolithic sacred places etched in the landscape for miles around. Back down on earth, at the visitor centre afterward, Nichola explained how the closure of Stonehenge had threatened hundreds of other sites nationally - it’s English Heritage’s biggest revenue-generator. They are hoping people will come back in droves now. Do go, if you haven’t for a while. You get a great view of the A303, which will be gone forever once the tunnel is finally dug.
Before Parliament was prorogued (i.e. suspended) for a new session (which starts with a new Queen’s Speech on Tuesday) opposition MPs were digging hard for dirt on Boris Johnson’s Downing St redecoration, and David Cameron’s work for Greensill Capital and the formal and informal contacts he had with ministers and officials. It’s right that both issues are looked at thoroughly, and independently. On Greensill, I asked the Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove a question in the Commons (see here) to confirm that the inquiry will have full access to all documents and decision-makers. I also made the point that we’ll never create systems so perfect - so transparent, so objective, so meritocratic - that human judgements will never be needed. That’s the fallacy that made us create an algorithm to decide students’ grades rather than trusting teachers. We can’t design out the human factor and nor should we. Instead we need a culture of probity and good conduct - a moral framework that ensures even informal or personal relationships, which can never be excluded from government, serve the public interest. That’s not to say we don’t also need tighter rules on lobbying and conflicts of interest; we do.
Otherwise it’s all been about the local elections, and Hartlepool’s Parliamentary by-election. I got up there for a day - or rather, I spent a day travelling up and down, and only got two hours in the town, going door-to-door for the Conservative candidate Jill Mortimer. En route I was delayed at Stockton and briefly explored the town. At a junction of two dual carriageways, opposite Burger King, a discrete granite sign marks the spot where the world’s first train trundled down the first track (from Darlington) in 1825.
The immense heritage and rightful pride of the north-east was evident in my conversations in Hartlepool too. Our victory there repeats the instruction, issued in the 2019 general election, to revive the fortunes of towns like these by a combination of infrastructure investment, improvements in skills, and a trade policy that supports domestic manufacture and exports. Fundamentally, though, in common with voters across England, voters in Hartlepool backed the party that seems to like our country and its people, and to believe in its future.
Wiltshire had a very good set of results too from a Conservative perspective, and locally in particular - 17 out of the 18 divisions of the council that fall in the Devizes Constituency are now Tory, and we have improved our position on Devizes Town Council. My congratulations to all victorious candidates, of whatever party, and I look forward to working with them in the years ahead.
A particular note of regret, however: Philip Whitehead is standing down as Leader. I’ve only been a Wiltshire politician for 18 months so I have a short acquaintance with Philip. But on our first meeting, when he drove me round his division of Urchfont and the Cannings, he explained the essence of the job: helping the communities of Wiltshire look after themselves. In Urchfont, he said, when the snow blocks the roads the people don’t wait for the council to come and clear them; the farmers do it themselves. That can-do, let’s-go, all-together spirit is indeed strong in this county and it’s something Philip - himself a Yorkshireman - clearly admires and supports. He has been a very good friend and mentor to me in my MP apprenticeship and I will miss his gruff friendly advice and reassurance. I’m glad he’s staying on the council and as a backbencher I hope he can now be less scrupulously impartial and hands-off about the bid for a new Devizes train station, which will be built in his division.
In the 18th century Urchfont was owned by the Pynsent family until they gave the whole estate as a gift to William Pitt the Younger, in gratitude for his opposition to a new tax of ten shillings on each hogshead of cider. Were there private drinks beforehand, and the Georgian equivalent of text messages between Pynsent and Pitt? Or was this just a heroic gesture of patriotism, and leadership disinterestedly rewarded? Anyway, Philip Whitehead is certainly owed some grand act of generosity; or at least a hogshead of cider.