Newspaper column 24 March 2022 - looking back at my work for you over the previous week

Last week was another busy one for me, with a lot going on both in Cornwall and in Parliament.

Ahead of the Keep Britain Tidy’s Great British Spring Clean event, which runs from 25^th March to 10^th April, I was pleased to lead my own beach clean with local residents and councillors on Perranporth Beach last weekend. Even with the particularly blustery weather and spectacular waves, the hard working beach cleaners managed to pick up four full sacks of rubbish over the course of an hour of cleaning – rubbish which is now removed from our marine ecosystem. There will be litter picks and beach cleans taking place all around Cornwall for the Keep Britain Tidy Great British Spring Clean and you can find out more via their website

https://www.keepbritaintidy.org/get-involved/support-our-campaigns/great-british-spring-clean

In Parliament I asked the Education Minister to re-affirm the Government’s plans to build a new secondary school in Perranporth. This will take students from the Perranporth, St Agnes, Cubert, Goonhavern, Holywell, St Newlyn East, Newquay and Truro area.

In 2020, after months of discussion, it was confirmed that I had secured a new secondary school for my constituency as part of the Government’s Free School Programme. This much-needed secondary school is set to be based near Perranporth and will make a huge difference to families on the North Coast.

I am in regular contact with the Department for Education and the local academy trust and we are so close to now securing a site for the school. I was pleased to see the Minister re-affirm the Government’s commitment to supporting and delivering a new secondary school in my Truro and Falmouth constituency as soon as possible and will continue to work with all involved to achieve this.

I also attended a meeting levelling up opportunities for South West region. This was an important meeting with leading regional housing associations, local government representatives and parliamentary colleagues to discuss how we can level up the South West and tackle one of the biggest issues for residents and local employees – the shortage of affordable housing. In particular, we discussed the need to provide more affordable housing for key workers to reduce staffing shortages in Cornwall. There is a huge amount of work going on to address this issue, and I will continue to keep it at the top of my agenda.

In Parliament I also had a meeting with the Health Secretary and the Minister for Patient Safety and Primary Care, ahead of the publication of the Women's Health Strategy later this Spring.

The need for this strategy is twofold:

First, to improve how the health and care system listens to women, and to reset our approach to women’s health by placing their voices at the centre of this work and second, to improve women’s health outcomes.

The Government’s consultation on this issue received nearly 100,000 responses from women across the country and over 400 written responses from organisations and experts working in the health sector and beyond and I look forward to seeing this information fed into the response and the strategy emerging soon, where it can positively impact on peoples lives.

As ever, if you need my assistance with anything then my team and I are here to help. Please get in touch with me by email at Cherilyn.mackrory.mp@parliament.uk , or by telephone on 01872 229698. My regular constituency advice surgeries are held in a covid-safe environment at my office, so please do get in touch should you wish to meet me about any matters that I can be of assistance with.