Last week I enjoyed judging a competition organised by the Parliamentary Education Service.

Students from three high schools and two sixth form colleges had to produce a name for a political party with a logo, motto and manifesto. One member of the team had to present the manifesto and then answer questions about it under time limits.

The points in the manifestoes had to cover education, health, justice, home affairs and environment and were wide-reaching and in some cases aggressive against anti-social behaviour, in favour of euthanasia and against free health care for repeated alcohol-induced injuries.

It was easy to pick out the two best presentations as three eliminated themselves with one, awful spelling on their public document, another, disjointed presentations and, the third, a shortened speech to allow more time for questions; not a wise move!

I judged the winner to be King’s High School, Warwick with a party name “Voices” and a slick motto “Vote for YOUR voice, vote for YOUR choice” appearing out of a speech bubble crowded with faces. Their manifesto was well presented, logically argued and well thought out. I liked their suggestion of “one no-car day per week in all major cities”.

I may take some points from these presentations for my own manifesto! I was relieved and delighted that all the votes on the measures for reform of the House from the Wright Committee were passed last Thursday. It was the first time in my parliamentary career that I, as an independent, had a form of whip with, of course, no attached compulsion. To avoid confusion, the Wright Committee pointed out the way to vote on each division for those supporting the Committee’s recommendations.

It was most helpful as these were all free votes and MPs are so unused to free votes that without guidance some may have got things wrong! Last Friday I attended the launch of Kemp Hospice’s Hospice at Home Service.

This is a welcome expansion to their tremendous work supporting end-of-life care and it really will make it possible for more people who wish to stay at home to do so. I am always impressed with the enthusiasm and dedication of all the staff at Kemp at all levels including the volunteers.

The result is a superb, whole-team effort. On Monday I visited the Lawrence Recycling & Waste Management development on Stourport Road. I was fascinated to see the innovative use that is being made of the huge redundant forge building that provides about five acres of covered space.

I was shown round the route through which the many thousand tonnes of industrial waste go to be sorted into plastic, wood, metal, glass, cardboard and paper, bricks and rubble, and turned into reusable products for this country or sold as exports to countries that have sophisticated equipment for sorting materials that are too expensive to sort manually here.

The value of the scrap amazed me but this is only through a facility like this that can mass produce useful recyclables. I was delighted to hear that the unit has spare capacity and so, conceivably, we could see them processing domestic waste on our doorstep in the future. DR RICHARD TAYLOR MP