For too many people across Portsmouth, politics has felt disconnected from everyday life for far too long.
Families have watched bills rise faster than wages. Young people have struggled to find affordable housing. Small businesses have battled rising costs and uncertainty. Public services that our city relies on from local healthcare to policing and transport have been stretched to breaking point after years of decline.
People here in Portsmouth are resilient. We are proud of our naval heritage, our communities, our workers, our entrepreneurs and our city’s fighting spirit. But pride alone cannot fix broken systems or reverse years of underinvestment.
That is why this King’s Speech matters.
This Labour government was elected to deliver change, not simply manage decline. The challenges facing Britain and cities like Portsmouth cannot be solved with small tweaks around the edges. We need a complete break from the failed status quo that has left working people carrying the burden while communities feel increasingly left behind.
In our first Parliamentary session, Labour passed 50 new pieces of legislation designed to begin rebuilding the foundations of the country. That includes the biggest expansion of workers’ rights in a generation, stronger protections for renters, action on anti-social behaviour and violence against women and girls, investment in clean British energy and steps to bring rail services back into public ownership and accountability.
Now we are going further.
For Portsmouth, this agenda means practical change that people will actually feel in their daily lives.
It means action to strengthen our economy and create skilled jobs for the future something especially important for our dockyard, defence sector, maritime industries and growing technology businesses. Labour’s plans for industrial strategy, apprenticeships and energy security can help unlock new opportunities for local workers and young people across our city.
It means tackling the housing pressures that so many Portsmouth residents face. With stronger renters’ rights, leasehold reform and renewed investment in social housing, we are beginning to restore fairness and security to a housing system that too often leaves families trapped or struggling.
It means rebuilding public services after fourteen years of austerity hollowed them out. Portsmouth residents deserve NHS services they can rely on, neighbourhood policing that is visible again and local government that has the tools and powers to deliver for communities.
And it means recognising Portsmouth’s vital role in our national security. As a proud naval city, we understand better than most that Britain must be strong, resilient and prepared in an increasingly uncertain world. Investment in defence, cyber security and our Armed Forces is not abstract policy here it supports jobs, families and our local economy.
But this is about more than legislation.
It is about restoring confidence that politics can still be a force for good.
Too many people have lost faith that government can improve their lives. I hear that frustration regularly on the doorstep, at my coffee mornings and in my constituency surgeries. People are tired of being told decline is inevitable. They want leadership that is honest about the challenges we face, but ambitious enough to believe Britain and Portsmouth can do better.
That is the choice facing our country.
We can accept stagnation, division and managed decline. Or we can choose renewal, resilience and opportunity.
Labour is choosing the second path.
There are no quick fixes, and no government can undo fourteen years of damage overnight. But step by step, we are beginning the work of rebuilding a country where hard work is rewarded, public services function properly, communities feel safe and secure and the next generation has more opportunities than the last.
Portsmouth deserves nothing less.
