Oral Contribution: 7th June, 2018
It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend Andy Slaughter, who gave a typically thoughtful and forensic speech. I will try to cheer him up even more if I can. On a day when no fewer than seven England squad players born in Yorkshire are to play at Elland Road, in their last match before the World cup, I intend to try to give the perspective from God’s own county; but I will not be able to do it nearly as well as Justine Greening did. She may have left Rotherham a while ago, but she retains a love of the north of England and Yorkshire, and a real passion. If I may say so, Adam Afriyie spoke with such knowledge of the north of England—he spoke, indeed, for the nation—that, by the powers invested in me, I make him an honorary Yorkshireman for the day...