Rutland and Stamford MP Alicia Kearns announces pregnancy as she looks back on an exciting 2024
I hope you had a wonderful Christmas surrounded by family and loved ones, writes Rutland and Stamford MP Alicia Kearns (Con).
It’s always my favourite time of year, from the joy of childrens’ excitement leaving milk and carrots for Santa, to spending a day (or so!) in pajamas eating some of the yummiest food of the year, and cozy nights with every excuse for movie watching and snuggling up together.
We are excited to share with you that we are expecting a little one to join and complete our family next year. Whilst this should be a time of joy, it’s been difficult for us as sadly I was hospitalised for a week in December due to a severe complication, and so I’ve spent Christmas resting and trying to get back to full strength ready for the demands of 2025 and all I want to deliver for our communities. I’m not out of the woods just yet, but hope it will all settle down.
Supporting all of you is the most meaningful part of my role, and I’m proud my team and I have resolved complex problems for over 2,560 residents this last year – that’s 49 people a week seeking help. This can be anything from housing issues or domestic abuse, to pension support, getting answers out of bureaucracies or medication access. In addition to this, 230 residents a week (excluding the election where as you can imagine my inbox was extremely busy!) have emailed asking for advice or to discuss national or local policies.
The election (whilst expected) came far earlier than any of us had predicted. With it, the communities I serve changed by around 50% and so I hit the doorsteps across three counties as hard as I could, and my heartfelt thanks goes to everyone who joined me in hail, severe rain, wind and the odd moment of sunshine to speak to residents, put up posters and more. Election night was very difficult for my party, and a great number of good friends lost their roles. To have such strong support from our communities, in such overwhelming difficult circumstances, was incredibly humbling and I am so very grateful.
The last year has seen a number of projects start to come to fruition. Lucy Stephenson and my £23.7 million Levelling Up funds now have electric buses serving us on the Uppingham Hopper and the R9 from Oakham to Stamford, the Black Horse pub re-opened thanks to funding I secured from Government, and the new Barrowden Village Hall is looking quite spectacular with help from the Community Ownership Fund we secured together. Construction on the new day treatment unit at Stamford and Rutland Hospital is well underway and we’re all looking forward to it opening next year. We can also celebrate a 53% increase in premises with access to gigabit broadband – although I have more work planned on this and to improve mobile phone signal especially around Stamford.
Turning to road safety, following the safety upgrades between Tinwell and Colsterworth I secured, I’m pleased National Highways has listened to our campaign and will be undertaking further safety upgrades on the A1 between South Witham and Little Ponton and closing up to 16 central reservation crossings along this stretch at the same time in Spring. Thank you to everyone who came to my public meeting in South Witham – the larger central reservation crossings will all be reviewed this year as well.
Then we had the new Banking Hub open in Oakham, which was brilliant as I know there had been much anxiety about moving to this new model of local banking. It has proven an overwhelming success, with residents now able to access five banks where previously there was just one.
In my continued efforts to put our communities in Ministers’ minds, this year I secured a visit from the then Levelling Up Minister, and the Flooding Minister following those awful floods we had early in the year. Thanks to his Oakham meeting with our farmers from across Rutland, Harborough and South Kesteven and visit to Tallington, the national criteria for flooding support was expanded to include extreme rainfall, and criteria was also changed to allow Rutland to finally access the Farming Recovery Grant for the first time. I also held Flooding Summits with Parish Councillors in Autumn and will be doing more of this in coming months.
Following the Budget, I supported our Conservative councillors whose motion calling on the Government to rescind its reforms to Agricultural Property Relief and Business Property Relief was the first agreed in the country. Many Councils have unsurprisingly followed in our stead, although I was disappointed at the Rutland Councillors who refused to back our farmers with the motion. I also delivered a letter to Number 10 opposing cuts to APR on behalf of thousands of farming organisations and farmers, and was pleased to welcome so many of our farmers to Parliament.
We sadly had the devastating news that Mallard Pass had been approved by the new Government, despite our presenting one of the biggest hand-signed petitions in history and the strong arguments against it. I am now working to improve compensation for our communities, protect our way of life, and protect agricultural land nationally.
2024 also saw the launch of ‘Rutland’s Great Dementia Conversation’ to improve our understanding of dementia, to increase awareness of local services and support, and to drive up our below average diagnosis rates. The campaign was supported by Stephen Fry, launched by John and Nula Suchet at the Victoria Hall, and concluded with an afternoon with national treasure Angela Rippon and a panel of National Dementia Experts. So many wonderful organisations, businesses and individuals stepped forward to make their groups more dementia friendly – thank you to you all.
Last but not least, it was an honour to finish the year in Parliament by being recognised as the Patchwork Foundation’s 2024 MP of the Year!
With that I’ve hit the word limit, so from my family to yours, Happy New Year.
