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How often do individuals make a difference?

Most MPs will be unable to point to any one thing they did that wouldn’t have happened without them. Occasionally, individuals make a difference, though. Polly Toynbee lists a few that have, as follows;

  • Barbara Castle’s lifesaving 70mph speed limit
  • Patricia Hewitt’s smoking ban
  • Harriet Harman’s childcare and nurseries
  • Roy Jenkins’s great 1960s “permissive society is a civilised society” reforms
  • David Steel’s Abortion Act.

Source: Politics is a rough trade, but Jamie Reed should be hanging in there | Polly Toynbee | Opinion | The Guardian

Posted in Britain, Politics, Trivia.


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