I RETURNED to London on May 11 for the election of the Speaker. I sat with Peter Law, the new Independent MP for Blaenau Gwent.

Although the Liberal Democrats I sit with have been very friendly, it was especially good to sit with somebody I can now refer to in parliamentary parlance as my Honourable Friend.

Michael Martin was duly re-elected as Speaker and as he has been so good to me on health issues, I was very glad that his re-election was unanimous.

The beginning of his term of office must have been difficult because of his predecessor's high profile and extrovert personality but he now controls effectively some of the more adversarial, irrelevant, political comments made from Government and opposition front benches during question times.

With other MPs, I took the oath of allegiance on May 12 and then after a weekend at home, returned to London for the Queen's Speech on Tuesday.

I sympathise with the Queen for having to read an even more tedious speech than usual as it was largely a list of the many Bills that the Government plans to bring to parliament in the next 18 months.

I was behind in the trail of MPs trying to squeeze into the House of Lords and so failed to hear a word from Her Majesty but was in position to obtain a written copy immediately she stopped speaking.

There were some references to her planned visits to Canada, Malta and Melbourne for the opening of the Commonwealth Games and then a state visit to Singapore.

The UK's Presidency of the European Union and of the G8 were both welcomed.

The aims expressed in the Queen's Speech were mostly laudable and drive forward the Government's aim of modernising public service delivery in education, health, welfare and crime.

What was not included is important and will have to be discovered and examined when each Bill comes before parliament.

For example, in the brief paragraph on the NHS she said : "Measures will be brought forward to introduce more choice and diversity in healthcare provision and to continue to improve the quality of health services and hospital hygiene."

Thus, to my relief, there was no mention of making health service managers legally liable for hospital-acquired infections which, to me, would not be the best way of encouraging the control of these dangerous bacteria.

There was no mention of the huge changes that are about to affect the NHS including increased use of the private sector and expansion of the numbers of foundation trusts or of the great challenge of providing the biggest computer system that has ever been attempted to bring all GPs, hospitals and clinics onto the same network.

Following these Bills and trying to make changes where necessary is the challenge for the next 18 months.