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GIVING YOUNG PEOPLE A VOICE! |
A day in the life of John Penrose MP
1st November 2007
By Imogen Walsh
When the opportunity arose for Lauren Fry and I to go down to Westminster, see the Houses of Parliament in action and shadow Weston’s MP John Penrose, we just couldn’t refuse!
The difficulty came when we had 15 minutes to get from one side of central London to the other... fortunately Mr Penrose didn’t seem to mind too much that we arrived almost an hour late.
• Our first task of the day was to attend his committee meeting on pensions. Although we didn’t know too much about the subject in hand we listened attentively and tried to learn as much as we could.
• We left the first committee somewhat content as Lembit Opik, whose fiancé is one of the Cheeky Girls, briskly walked past giving us a quick glance, though I was very surprised that we managed to remember his name.
• We then had the privilege of being able to attend Prime Minister’s Question Time. This had to be the highlight of our day, being able to sit and listen to people asking relevant questions on current events and even the odd joke or two aimed at the opposition.
It was really exciting to see PM Gordon Brown and the leader of the opposition, David Cameron, battling it out to win everyone over. I think there was even a joke made about David Cameron comparing himself to Arnold Schwarzenegger. It must have been the quickest 30 minutes of my life as it seemed to flash by. Before we knew it Gordon Brown stood up to have his last word and everyone rushed away.
• The afternoon proved a very eventful one, seeing some political idol every couple of minutes. Lauren and I were enjoying a coffee when Boris Johnson rushed past us and stood at the table near us chatting away. He didn’t notice us until it become obvious we were staring at him - a quick smile and he was off again, rushing to his next meeting.
Many people would agree that Anne Widdecombe may be seen as controversial in her approach to tackling problems. When she passed us I was expecting a loud, gregarious person but nevertheless she was quiet, introvert and definitely not what we were expecting.
A few more people on our list of names were Charles Clark, David Milliband and even the most recent contender for party leadership of the Liberal Democrats, Chris Huhne.
We thoroughly enjoyed the day in the life of a politician and it is definitely on the cards as a future career prospect. We would like to say thank you to Mr Penrose for hosting the day and for his kind staff who had put up with our nonsense questions and curiosity.
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