If it’s not unfashionable to write it, a Happy New Year to you and yours!

I’m now back as your Member of Parliament and back in Westminster. This week we have had the election of our new speaker (or re-election as Lindsay Hoyle had been in the role for two days before the election intervened).

Bexhill and Battle MP, Huw Merriman, has challenged the Chief Executive of Highways England to justify its approach to road building and improvements on the A21. The exchange came during a Transport Select Committee evidence session in Parliament on the work of Highways England last week.

In my last column, I wrote about Parliament being prorogued, and our subsequent return to Westminster when the Supreme Court ruled the suspension to be unlawful. As a result, I’ve spent two weeks back in Parliament and we have just been prorogued again.

My look back at yet another eventful week in Parliament.

My thoughts on an eventful and challenging week in Parliament.

I’ve always supported delivering the referendum result and leaving on time on agreed terms with the EU. It is for this reason that I voted three times in Parliament for the Withdrawal Agreement (which would have taken us out of the EU by now), three times to keep No Deal on the table (to give the strongest negotiating hand) and failed to vote with the Government to extend Article 50 at the end of May. Failing to leave is not only causing many to lose faith in democracy and political promises, it makes it harder to turn a new page and focus on the domestic reforms which we need locally (with particular reference to social care). It also causes economic stagnation and uncertainty.

Since I was first elected four years ago, I’ve been struck by the increase in rough sleeping as well as a rise in intimidating behaviour in Bexhill. It’s not just through my own eyes.

This summer I am knocking on doors with a survey which asks residents what priorities they have for me when Parliament returns. With 50,000 doors across the constituency, I will not get to everyone but hope to get as many views as possible.

Parliament has broken for the summer recess, meaning that my main place of work for the next six weeks will be across the 200 square miles of the Bexhill and Battle constituency.