Our Spotlight this week is shining on Saqib Bhatti one of the exciting new intake of 2019 MPs.
Saqib is a chartered accountant and prior to entering parliament he ran an accountancy business focussed on small and medium-sized businesses.
He is a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales and in 2019 was awarded an honorary doctorate from Aston University in Business Administration and in the same year was awarded an MBE for Services to Business.
Saqib served on a number of boards around the West Midlands prior to being elected including the Lunar Society, the Westside Business District, the Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership and he was the youngest-ever President of the Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce. The Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce is one of the oldest Chambers of Commerce in the world and serves over 3000 businesses.
As a director of the Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership, under his portfolio, the Greater Birmingham and Solihull area had the largest number of start-ups outside of London for over 5 years.
Saqib feels passionately about Britain’s place in the world, so he launched Muslims for Britain and made the Brexit case to the Muslim community. Through the campaign, over 800,000 British Muslims voted to leave. He also served on the national board of Vote Leave. He also served as Deputy Chair of Andy Street’s political team for many years working to deliver a Conservative Mayor for the West Midlands.
Entering Parliament in 2019, Saqib has had several positions including Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) for the Secretary of State for International Trade, the Rt Hon Liz Truss MP and PPS for the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care the Rt Hon. Sajid Javid MP. He was recently elected to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Given his background in business, he was asked by the Prime Minister to serve as Vice Chair of the Party, with a focus on business engagement, having first been appointed by Liz Truss.
He spends his spare time volunteering on a number of boards, including serving on the board of the West Midlands Reserve Forces and Cadets Association. In 2019 he raised £27,000 for Prostate Cancer UK by jumping out of a plane and has previously worked for international charities to provide education and training for women and girls.
But what has he done for Meriden?
He’s secured £50m from the Treasury towards the Arden Cross development and £45m from the West Midlands Mayor, creating an economic zone which will make the development a global economic hub, attracting both investment and jobs. His constituency is home to the HS2 Interchange station, so he is focussed on doing his utmost to mitigate the impact of HS2 on the greenbelt and holding HS2 Limited to account.
He also campaigned to secure funding for Arden Academy from the £1.8bn School Rebuilding Programme, investing in state-of-the-art learning environments for pupils such as new classrooms, science labs, sports halls, and dining halls. Both projects provide infrastructure but also protect the greenbelt in his area and the Meriden Gap which is a vital throughway in Britain for migrating wildlife.
With the consultation on the National Planning Policy Framework, Saqib is leading the charge to stop the constant attacks on the green belt, with reforms to stop land banking and ensuring Meriden constituents are no longer compelled to make significant sacrifices to meet Birmingham planning demands. In addition, reforms to the planning inspectorate are essential in his view, so the wishes of communities are protected and not ignored.
Understanding and seeing just how important local healthcare facilities were through Covid during his time in the Department of Health and Social Care, Saqib campaigned for the return of the local minor injuries unit. Launching a petition and campaigning for better health services across the Meriden constituency has seen the announcement that the minor injuries unit at Solihull Hospital will return later this year.
He is also campaigning to protect Solihull Police Station which successive Labour Police and Crime Commissioners have failed to do. He views the protection and security of his constituents as his primary role.
Everything for Saqib comes down to making Meriden the best constituency to live in, and ensuring local residents are able to enjoy their local communities. That is why, when he was elected, he promised to do several things including protecting the green belt, saving the local police station, and delivering Brexit as the people voted for it.
The Meriden constituency is named after the village of Meriden, which is halfway between Coventry and Solihull and was for a long time believed to be the geographic centre of England. It has a large war memorial dedicated to all of the cyclists who died in the First World War and contains many beautiful buildings and the picturesque Molands Bridge over the Blythe.
Final quote:
“The cause of conservatism is more relevant today than it has ever been. Our message of low taxation, of protecting the family unit, of the rights of the individual to be free from interference from big government must be at the heart of everything we do.
“Our communities need conservatism, and our country does. When my father came to this country in the late 1960s, he came in pursuit of the Great British Dream. Only conservatism can deliver this.”
Follow MP Saqib Bhatti on Twitter here.
Or find out more and get in contact with Saqib on his website: www.saqibbhatti.org.uk
By Steven Barrett, Councillor for Tyles Green & Loudwater, BUCKS Unitary Council.
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