WITH the excitement and sore feet of the election campaign over, it's back to work and Parliament this week.

It is a great honour to be re-elected as the Member of Parliament for Redditch and I am looking forward to serving all my constituents - those who voted for me and those who didn't - for the coming term.

I began by attending the Open Day at the Redditch Fire Station.

This was a good event with demonstrations of fire fighting and information about fire safety.

I will now be checking my smoke alarms monthly, shutting my internal doors before going to bed and never leaving my television on stand-by. I was also impressed at the effort the firefighters have made to reach out to the community.

They have visited every school in Redditch and made presentations to community groups. They deserve congratulation for this on top of the crucial and lifesaving work that they do.

In Parliament, we will be electing the Speaker and taking the oath and then it will be the Queen's Speech which will spell out the first programme of legislation for the government.

I'm hoping to see major Bills on improving public services. Secondary education, health and crime fighting must be priorities.

On Saturday, with Labour councillor colleagues, I'll be out knocking on doors again and talking to local people.

Politics is for life - not just for elections!