Over the weekend I appeared on Times Radio as part of their ‘Political Frenemies’ segment. I was a guest alongside the Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat who, despite being on the opposite side of the political divide, has been my ‘frenemy’ in Parliament since we were both first elected in 2015.
I have worked closely with Tom in his capacity as chair of the counter-extremism Parliamentary group following the appalling terror attack on our community at London Bridge and Borough Market in 2017. I was honoured to be able to take over from Tom as chair of the group when he was promoted to chair the Foreign Affairs Committee, which I also sit on myself. Most recently the committee has been scrutinising the Government’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, which has affected hundreds of families in Southwark whose relatives have been caught up in the chaos.
Tom and I also both worked closely with Jo Cox before she was tragically murdered in 2016. It was great to use our appearance to talk about how MPs from different parties can share common ground, as I do with Tom on issues like foreign policy and counter extremism, but also to have friendly disagreements on issues like last week’s Budget.
The full programme, with my appearance starting at 00:19:30, is available to stream here: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/…/show/20211030-6852/2021-10-30