(This item appears on the Brighton Argus on 21st August 2023) Last week marked the halfway point in August and it is now possible to observe the activities so far of members of Parliament. Clearly there are many public opportunities for them to be acting in their constituency areas and indeed in other areas or across the UK. However, the information that is provided by the ‘TheyWorkForYou’ website provides us with the opportunity to consider how MPs have been able to approach the summer holiday period. It will be interesting to review again in early September in case any of them have acted more positively than what they have done so far.

These comments are based on the first half of August and also at the end of the Parliament which was closed on the 20^th July. In Sussex we have 16 MPs, eight of which are Ministers for the current Government and so they are required to respond to written questions from the other members of Parliament. The other five Sussex Conservative MPs are entitled to submit questions during the Summer along with the two Labour MPs and the one Green MP all three of which are based in Brighton and Hove. Caroline Lucas is the only green member in the whole of the Parliament so her contributions are very significant. During the end of July all MPs finished corresponding in Parliament and in the first half of August several of them have not raised any questions within the structure of the Government website. The Conservative members involve Sally-Ann Hart from Hastings and Rye who last corresponded on the 18^th July and Caroline Ansell from Eastbourne and Henry Smith from Crawley who both last corresponded on 19^th July. The Hove Labour member who is Peter Kyle last contributed on 18^th July. So far, none of these four Sussex representatives have not published any written questions to the Government since then.

Of the eight Conservative Ministers Gillian Keegan has not corresponded since the presentation she made on 20^th July on the day the Parliament closed. The other seven colleagues have been involved in providing answers to some members of Parliament that have submitted written questions since the end of Parliament. Mims Davies from Mid Sussex last spoke on July 12^th and Jeremy Quin from Horsham last spoke on July 13^th although they both answered written questions until the end of the Parliament session on July 20^th. Andrew Griffith from Arundel and South Downs last spoke on the 18^th July and Maria Caulfield from Lewes did so on the 19^th July. However, Nusrat Ghani from Wealden, Nick Gibb from Bognor Regis and Littlehampton and Huw Merriman from Bexhill and Battle spoke on 20^th July.  All of these did respond with answers to questions from other MPs who have raised questions since the closure of the Parliament. These Sussex Minister MPs have so far contributed to nearly 100 responses from MPs that have sent questions to the Government. Mims Davies so far has only responded to four MPs and two of them, Maria Caulfield and Nick Gibb have given more than 20 responses each, with the most from Nick. The others have responded nearly ten responses each, however since the week beginning the 7^th of August, they have all only supplied two responses between them. I am keen to see what will take place this week and next week in preparation for the opening up of Parliament

There are only four Sussex MPs who have submitted questions so far. Tim Loughton from East Worthing and Shoreham and Lloyd Russell-Moyle from Brighton Kemptown both asked two questions on Tuesday 25^th July. Peter Bottomley from Worthing West asked for three questions on the 25^th July and then he asked for one more question on the next day. The three questions from Peter Bottomley on the Tuesday were headlined on “Alternative Fuel Payments”. One of them included the question

how much and what proportion of the funding allocated to the Energy Bills Support Scheme Alternative Funding scheme was not paid to eligible vulnerable households and how much and what proportion of that funding will be retained by his department and put to alternative uses

The other MP who has demonstrated a much more significant number of questions is Caroline Lucas from Brighton Pavilion who asked five on the day after the Parliament closed down and then asked four on the 24^th July, five on the 25^th July and since has asked for one final question on August 11^th two of the questions on the 24^th July included as

to embed support for patients who are parents and their children into adult mental health services and to monitor the maintenance of contact between parents admitted to psychiatric in-patient mental health services and their dependent children.

As it happened the Minister who responded was Maria Caulfield and she initially stated

The community mental health framework sets out the vision for transformation of community mental health services as part of the NHS Long Term Plan. The framework sets the expectation that mental health services should ensure ‘joined-up, ongoing, personalised care and support, and access to the right care at the right time for service users and for their families and carers’.

It is important that questions are asked. We should all feel able to call upon our MPs to ask questions even when Parliament is closed. We should all be expecting better answers from the MP’s that represent us.