‘There’s something special about representing your home town’: Emma Hardy
‘I DON’T WANT TO BE PRIME MINISTER’: Emma Hardy sets the ceiling on her political ambition
Chewing the Fat - out to lunch with Phil Ascough
This week’s guest: Emma Hardy MP
A month that had begun with a private lunch in the company of three political heavyweights concluded with a much more public audience with Hull’s newest MP.
Chatham House rules prevent me from posting a full report on the proceedings which followed Alastair Campbell’s interview by Paul Sewell as part of the Elevenses series at Humber Business Week.
Suffice to say the banter was rife as the strategist behind Labour’s hat-trick of emphatic election victories in 1997, 2001 and 2005 reminisced with old pals Lord Prescott, former deputy prime minister, and Alan Johnson, who many wish had decided to run for the top job.
The session did inspire a couple of questions for Emma Hardy as we chatted a little over five years after her election in 2017 as Alan’s successor. What are her political ambitions? And would she ever punch a voter?
We met at Wrecking Ball, the wonderful collaboration in Whitefriargate which brought together an independent book publishing company and a local purveyor of CDs, vinyl and other stuff which accompanies such delights.
Since opening nearly two years ago they’ve added a small café where we lunched on paninis, cake and pastry sweet treats, coffee and a peppermint tea. There’s also performance space upstairs which is attracting some top musicians and which launched in May 2021.
A few folk chatted to us as they passed our table. Others just collected their drinks and sank into the sofas. Gary Marks, one of the co-owners, enthused about the booming ticket sales for a 40th anniversary gig by Bridlington-based Indie rockers International Rescue. I’ve still got the press kit for their 1987 album Leather Jacket promising “an amalgam of sounds with influences as diverse as Verlaine and Waits”.
Leaving side those two politics questions, in readiness for meeting Emma in such an esteemed venue I’d also prepared two music teasers, which flopped dismally.
What was number one on the day she was born? Initially Emma thought she hadn’t heard of Are Friends Electric? by Tubeway Army, but her face beamed with recognition when we played a clip. First record ever bought? Opposites Attract by Paula Abdul. Moving swiftly on…
She said: “I like Wrecking Ball. There’s a really good atmosphere here. It’s relaxed. If I’m in a record shop I’m more likely to head to the books aisle. They have some really good books here by local authors and about our local area.
“The space is great. We had an endometriosis coffee morning here.”
‘I’M ALWAYS DRAWN TO THE BOOK AISLE’: Emma Hardy at Wrecking Ball Music and Books
Women’s health is a big priority, with Emma also driving campaigns around vaginal mesh and, most recently, greater awareness of the impact of the menopause, including plans for a wellbeing event in Hull.
There’s also a sharp focus on issues which present specific problems in Hull. Emma is at the vanguard of the RE:uniform campaign, working to promote the supply of fair-priced, unbranded school uniforms and to provide free, second-hand school wear for local children who need it.
Work Hull Work Happy is another ongoing project, and everything is set against a backdrop of events in 2007 which will never be forgotten.
Emma said: “Flooding is one of the biggest threats to the city and the other is high quality jobs. We have the talent in the city and the university and among local residents but we don’t have the same opportunities as London. Work Hull Work Happy encourages businesses to think about designing their jobs so they can be taken up locally.
“You should not have to leave the place you love for the job you want. If you really want to improve things for the people in this city you have to create the jobs – and you have to stop places getting flooded.”
Emma’s route to Westminster was at first unlikely, and then rapid. Born in Leicester, she moved to North Newbald with her family at the age of four when her dad became head of the village primary school.
“It was a small place with 65 pupils,” Emma recalled.
“I went to the same school and he left when I got to the juniors because he didn’t want to teach me. He said he already had me all day at home, and all day at school would be too much!”
Dad moved to the Elloughton where he worked until retirement. Emma progressed via secondary school in Market Weighton and sixth form at Wyke to study politics at Liverpool University.
She said: “It wasn’t because I wanted to be a politician. I’d wanted to do history but they under-predicted my grades and I was accepted onto the politics course but not the history course.”
A postgraduate certificate in education followed at Leeds University, with Emma also picking up a bit of work in bars, restaurants and, briefly, a building society.
‘LEAVING TEACHING WAS A WRENCH BUT I’M A MORE ROUNDED POLITICIAN NOW’: Emma Hardy
She said: “I worked at Abbey National for six months as a customer manager. It sounds grand but it really wasn’t. I had to stand by the door and direct people to the cash machines and cashiers.”
Emma started teaching in 2003 at a primary school in Immingham and moved to another in Willerby 18 months later. But it wasn’t until 2011 that she started to become active in the National Union of Teachers.
She said: “We had a meeting about downsizing the school and it ended up like a confessional, talking about our concerns in education and what was going on. There was huge change happening under the coalition and we were sharing our frustration and anger.
“I joined a coach from Hull going to a big TUC demo in London and we had a really good day. People were saying the things that I was feeling about the profession at the time. They were articulating what I thought and I felt quite at home in the trade union movement.”
Emma first met Alan Johnson at an event in Hessle Town Hall to celebrate his 10th anniversary as the local MP. After being talked into becoming the NUT’s East Riding young teacher officer, she met him again as part of a lobbying campaign.
She said: “He was completely charming and gave me a tour of Parliament. On the way back from London I sent him an email and told him I was going to join the Labour Party.
“Things really changed for me between 2011 and 2015, when I decided to pursue education politics and took a full-time job with the NUT, but was really sad to leave teaching.”
Her career path brought Emma into contact with some now familiar, even notorious, political figures. In 2013 she was invited to meet Liz Truss shortly after the then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Education had declared that the answer to problems in education was to provide more textbooks.
In 2014 she worked with a friend to organise an education conference where the panellists included Dominic Cummings, who had recently left the role of special adviser to Education Secretary Michael Gove.
She said: “We found him fascinating to watch because he’s one of those people, and there are very few, who really don’t care what people think of him.”
As a full-time official Emma set out building bridges between the union and the Labour Party, improving relations which were still strained from bust-ups with David Blunkett dating back to the 1990s. The 2017 election accelerated her political career.
CHOSEN: Emma Hardy, photographed by Karl Turner MP moments after being selected as the Labour candidate to succeed Alan Johnson
The shock was Alan’s decision not to stand. The surprise was Emma’s selection from a field which included strong candidates from elsewhere in the country plus Daren Hale, who later became leader of Hull City Council, and David Prescott, son of John.
She recalled: “They had to find somebody quickly so I spoke to friends in Hessle Labour and they said I should go for it. I genuinely didn’t expect to get it. I was up against people who were much more well-known than I was but I was shortlisted and went for an interview in London.
“I can’t remember much about the interview. It’s all a bit of a blur. But I do remember being terrified before I went in. Daren went in before me and while we waited I was sitting next to him, feeling really nervous.”
The Hull East MP Karl Turner had invited Emma to go and see him in Parliament after the interview.
She said: “We were having a drink on the terrace, he asked me how it went and then I got a phone call saying I had been selected. It was a total shock. They wanted to announce it straight away and asked me for an official photo to go with the release. I didn’t have any so we ran around Parliament trying to find an area with a blank wall where Karl could take one.”
Emma’s aim from the outset was to continue her work in education politics. She joined the Education Select Committee and progressed further but stepped down from the post of Shadow Minister for Universities as the pandemic workload piled up with her day job at home with daughters Olivia and Isabelle and partner James.
She said: “It was impossible to balance being a Parliamentary MP, a constituency MP and a mum doing home schooling.”
Membership of the Commons Treasury Select Committee since April 2021 is evidence of Emma broadening her experience, and enjoying it.
She said: “I am more rounded now as a politician doing more economics and trying to get people to pay the taxes they owe! I like being able to interview the Governor of the Bank of England and the Chancellor, the Financial Conduct Authority and the finance committee from Germany.
“It’s a really powerful and influential committee and with the economy being in such a mess it’s really interesting to be involved and have a front row seat. A big part of going straight into education was that it’s what I knew. It’s a comfort zone, but now I have had a bit longer and one of the privileges of the job is the chance to discover other areas and gain new expertise.”
So back to those probing questions. There was no response to “punchgate”, and indeed none was expected. The first brought a rapid: “My political ambition is not to be Prime Minister!”
ENCOUNTER: Emma Hardy bumps into Hull playwright Dave Windass at Wrecking Ball Music and Books
It was crystal clear that such a view was not down to any sympathy for the man who held the office at the time of our lunch and who, just a few days later, was ditched by his Conservative colleagues.
Indeed, it could be argued what whatever Boris Johnson said, his behaviour demonstrated he didn’t really want the job anyway, and certainly not the onerous responsibilities which it carries. Similarly, those who offered themselves as successors did so with campaigns so flimsy it begged the question whether they’d even remembered to sign their application forms.
Emma’s position is all about the recognition that, if carried out with such attributes as honesty and diligence, the role of Prime Minister takes over your life.
A few years ago Emma’s predecessor, considered by many to be the best PM we never had, told me he never considered bidding for the role. He values his freedom and his privacy far too much to be constantly surrounded by bodyguards.
It’s maybe easy to forget, with a government claiming a mandate for life from an 80-seat majority already reduced to 75 through its own misdeeds more than anything else, that Labour achieved a margin of 179 in 1997, 167 in 2001 and 66 in 2005.
Emma’s view of Labour’s defeats in 2010 and 2015: “We’d have won with Alan.”
Education will always be a passion, and Emma admits she will seize on any excuse to visit a primary school.
She said: “I offered my services to schools during Covid and I visit schools when I can. Recently I took a year 5 class for an hour and that was great fun. Their favourite story about Parliament is usually the one about how many mice there are – we have humane mouse catchers underneath the green benches!
“I go into schools for Parliamentary week talking about my role as an MP, and for Butterfly City, talking about conservation. Sometimes there’s something to promote, such as RE:uniform, but it’s always general – I never talk about politics.”
Above all, she takes pride in having the opportunity to represent the people of her home city and region.
She said: “There’s something special about representing your home town and I was fed up with shouting at the TV. Someone said I had been parachuted into my constituency and I replied that it must have been a very small parachute!”