Ayrshire MP Plans For Burns Supper At Parliament

A new SNP MP has said she hopes to host a Burns Supper at Parliament next year now the county of his birth is completely represented by her party.

Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) invoked Scotland' s national bard as she made her maiden speech in the House of Commons.

She said: Now that the county of his birth is completely represented from these benches, I would hope that we might host a fine Burns Supper next January.I'm sure we will extend an invitation.''

Quoting from Robert Burns' poem To a Mouse, she added: I'm sure it has been observed by the House that there's nae 'wee, sleekit, cowran, tim'rous beasties here'.''

Dr Whitford, who is the SNP's health spokeswoman at Westminster, also used her speech to highlight the importance of giving children a good start in life.

She said: Health comes from having a decent start in life, health comes from strong public health measures to tackle things like the prevention of diabetes.

But its most important foundation is what happens in childhood and as we now sadly know what even happens in pregnancy.''

In her constituency, she said child poverty had climbed from 20-25% since 2010 - despite a fall in unemployment from 6-4%.

That is one in four of our children growing up in poverty,'' she went on.

These are not the children of shirkers and of slackers as is often implied - 64.5% of them have a working parent.

We need to invest in our children, but not just in them, in their families to change their future.

There is no point in talking about focussing on schools if they are sitting shivering and hungry at home.

The first duty of any government is the security of their citizens - not with regard to replacing weapons of mass destruction, but the real security that comes from knowing you can keep a roof over your head and food on the table.''