Letter from Parliament - Simon Danczuk MP

Simon Danczuk, Rochdale MP

I want to start this week’s letter by offering my deep condolences to relatives and friends of the three Hain family members who were tragically killed in a car accident while recently on holiday in Norfolk. I know the family were members of St Thomas’ church in Newhey and I’m sure everyone will be praying for the Hains and offering support to other family members.

The great diversity of Rochdale never ceases to amaze me and rarely does a week pass when I don’t hear news of the achievements of people from Rochdale all over the country. This week is no exception and I was intrigued to learn that the Prime Minister has appointed someone from Rochdale as the new Culture Secretary. Sajid Javed was born in Rochdale and went on to become a very wealthy banker, earning £3million a year at Deutsche Bank. Whenever I see him I remind him of his Rochdale roots and hope he won’t forget the issues that matter to people in our town.

I was pleased to attend the book launch last week of Liz Kershaw, another well-known Rochdalian. Liz has taken a brave stand against bullying in the workplace and deserves a lot of credit. Next week will see the launch of a book I wrote with my colleague Matt Baker on our town’s former MP Cyril Smith. Power, abuse and cover up are themes we’re all too familiar with, unfortunately, but this is a story I felt had to be told for our town to move on. I’d like to thank everyone locally who contacted me to share their experiences of Cyril.

This week I asked the Prime Minister about the case of my constituent Paul Cowdrey, who is about to get his house repossessed by a solicitor who Paul had complained about simply because he felt he was being overcharged. It’s a terrible case but I was pleased that the Prime Minister said the Justice Minister would look into it.

There is an urgent need to devolve more power to local authorities and develop smarter approaches to growing local economies. Local authorities should already be looking at everything they can do to help local businesses and that’s why I’m disappointed to see Rochdale Council still sending out bills asking for business rates payments over 10-months instead of 12. The Chancellor has urged councils to spread the payments over 12-months and businesses should have this flexibility.