Blog - Chris Matheson MP

Parliamentary pub of the year

In the last couple of weeks, I have been running a public poll on my Facebook page to choose the best pub in Chester. Each year, MPs are asked to make a nomination for the Parliamentary Pub of the Year and I thought this would be a good way to…

Out of bounds

Much of the talk in Westminster this week has been about the new parliamentary constituency boundaries, published by the Boundary Commission on Monday. But even as they have been revealed, there are some doubts they will be adopted. There are two main flaws with the proposals. The first is that…

Cuts have consequences

News last week that Torbay Council in Devon has become the fourth council in England to declare emergency financial controls will come as no surprise. Many readers will have seen that Northamptonshire County Council has effectively gone bust and is now being run by Commissioners appointed by the Secretary of…

Super Trees Steve

Steve Hughes is an industrial chemist from Chester. He is also a runner – a serious runner. Steve organises the Park Run every Saturday morning in the Countess Country Park, where up to a hundred runners of all ages and all abilities take part whether to compete against their own…

100th anniversary of women having the right to vote

Parliament, indeed the whole country, has been celebrating the 100th anniversary of women having the right to vote. In fact, in 1918 it was only women over 30 who could vote, and it took another decade, to 1928, for the age that women could vote to be equalised with that…

Reflections on the Armed Forces…

For the first thirty years of my life, Northern Ireland was ever present. Every night on the news would be more depressing stories of bombings, brutal sectarian killings, or British soldiers being shot and often killed themselves. For younger generations, we still need to explain the background to this: decades…

Reflections on cancer and local support

When I first visited the Hospice of the Good Shepherd in Backford, a couple of years ago, I confess to feeling a bit of trepidation. I expected somewhere a bit grim, a place where people with terminal cancer went to spend their final days. In fact, I could not have…

Brexit at all costs is not an option for me.

Like a vampire with its victim in a 1960s Hammer Horror film, Brexit continues to suck the life out of politics and society. It is not as though we don’t have other problems to worry about. Homelessness has doubled since 2010, while in the same period real wages have flatlined.…

On the buses

Mention policy on buses to any national newspaper political journalist and the chances are you will be sneered at. Buses are a fringe issue, they will say. But local bus services are a vital lifeline to so many residents, not just for transport but also for social issues. Last year,…

Think big, stay local…

There is a saying that “all politics is local.” Which means that however much we hear about international affairs and national budgets, much more of what affects people is the stuff on their own doorstep. If I look at my postbag for this year, there is some truth in that:…

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