Lizzi Collinge

I thank the hon. Member for Kingswinford and South Staffordshire (Mike Wood) for raising the important issue of heritage pubs. I grew up in a small village in north Cumbria. We were lucky enough to have two pubs, both of which I worked in as a teenager—most memorably one Christmas day, when I was presented with a Mrs Santa Claus outfit to wear. As a teenager more interested in heavy metal, I was not very pleased. Those pubs were important community hubs. I feel lucky to be representing the constituency of Morecambe and Lunesdale, which has many more excellent pubs than I could possibly mention in one speech. Before this debate, I went on Facebook to ask my constituents what their favourite heritage pub was. The comments section was absolutely inundated—it was fantastic to see the passion that my constituents have for their locals. Morecambe and Lunesdale has dozens of great public houses, many with beautiful heritage features or important heritage settings. The Old Hall Inn in my town of Heysham is apparently the oldest dwelling in the borough, having been built in 1598. People can go from the Black Bull in Sedbergh to the Royal in Heysham, perhaps via a cheeky pint of Wainwright in the Albion at Arnside, looking across at the lakeland fells. They could even engage in a “west end wobble” in the heart of Morecambe, usually starting at the Exchange, possibly popping into the Constitutional Club and finding their way to the newly opened Prince Albert on Albert Road, which has a fantastic cellar that no one could guess existed from the outside. We are spoilt for choice. I invite any hon. Member here to come on a little pub crawl with me. I maintain that I have the most beautiful constituency in the country. Any visitor to our pubs will get to see every corner of it.