MP’s crusade to restore faith in British politicians
10:14am Thursday 14th August 2008
While most MPs are relaxing on a foreign beach, Lee Scott has chosen to work through the summer recess. Reporter CRYSTAL WILDE visited him at Westminster to find out what makes him tick.
AS I tucked into a delicious three-course meal at Westminster’s Adjournment Restaurant, a calorie-conscious Lee Scott explained why our feast would not be featuring on his expenses.
“I made some pledges before I was elected, one of which was that I wouldn’t take a second home on taxpayers’ money and the other was that I wouldn’t take foreign trips unless they related to my constituency, or work I was doing in Parliament,” he said.
“I decided to do this for the simple reason that I know people don’t trust politicians and I wanted to put the trust back, so I try and do that wherever I can.”
So while his leader David Cameron, takes time out holidaying with his family in Cornwall and Turkey, this MP has remained at home, running surgeries and visiting constituents.
Sitting opposite me in an open-necked shirt, with no tie, Mr Scott assured me that his ’New Conservative’ look was a consequence of the muggy weather and not a symptom of his party’s new, more relaxed image.
Having voted for gay rights, an inquiry into the Iraq war and for Britain to replace its nuclear arsenal, the MP has been something of an enigma since he was elected in 2005.
He said: “I think the Conservatives have proven that there is a place for every different political sphere in the party.
“For some issues I am left or centre and for others I am right, but I suppose I would always call myself a traditionalist because I believe in upholding values.”
Despite being born and bred in Wanstead, Mr Scott and I soon found some common ground when he told me of his love for Yorkshire, my native county, where he spent eight years working for a Jewish charity in Leeds.
He hosted various celebrity visitors to the centre, including former US president George Bush Senior, and US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, before moving back to Redbridge to scratch his political itch.
He was first elected to the council in 1998 and won his seat in Parliament seven years later.
Top of his current list of national concerns are health, education and youth crime and, locally, Mr Scott has vowed to stand against the Government’s plan for polyclinics and has demanded more swimming pools be built in the borough.
He said: “I’m proud to be a member of Parliament but what means the most is that I have been elected by the people from where I grew up.
“Although Redbridge has problems like everywhere else, it’s a wonderful place to live and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.
“If you talk to the people who live there, you’ll find a lot of them grew up in Redbridge just like me and have never really left.”