Mr Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough)

I am most grateful to you, Mr. Speaker, for calling me so early in this Session in such an august debate as this one on the Gracious Speech.

I was told before I entered the House that it was customary for a new Member to be congratulated on his maiden speech. Senior colleagues informed me that I was unlikely to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker for the next year. While I am looking forward to the comradely and friendly words of my colleagues after I have made this speech, I hope that the second part of the prophecy proves false.

As is the custom of the House, I wish to refer to my immediate and distinguished predecessor, the right hon. Arthur Bottomley. My predecessor came from the east end of London. He was the national organiser of the National Union of Public Employees from 1935 to 1941. He first entered the House in 1945. There was a short lapse on his part when he lost his seat at Rochester and Chatham in 1959. But he returned to the House to represent Middlesbrough, East from 1962. He retired gracefully at the last election after serving for 21 years. Arthur Bottomley asked me, when I came to the House, to get myself sworn in early. When I asked him why that was, he said that in 30 years' time I would be well placed to become the Father of the House. Arthur Bottomley has great hopes and expectations of me. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear."]

I wish to say one word on behalf of his wife, Dame Bessie. In all the years that Arthur Bottomley served his country, and he rose to be the fifth-ranking Cabinet Minister in 1964 when he became Secretary of State for Commonwealth Affairs, she was always at his side. Dame Bessie gave him great aid and comfort through his long and distinguished career.

I might have been in the House of Commons 27 years ago when I was 18, not on the Floor of the House but in the parliamentary Gallery. My youthful ambition was to be a Hansard reporter—

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