“I’ve been proud to represent the constituency of North West Durham over the past 18 years. The last two decades have been a time of great change for the North East region, for County Durham, and for my constituency. Some changes have been painful, and some necessary, as the economy evolves.

North West Durham is a rather technical and geographical term that doesn’t really express the varied nature of the constituency, the vastness of its scale, nor the beauty of the landscape.

The constituency stretches from the border with Gateshead in the North to the River Wear as it enters Bishop Auckland in the south. From the outskirts of the historic City of Durham, a World Heritage Site, in the east up to the stunningly picturesque area of Weardale, part of the North Pennines in the west.

I often tell my colleagues in London that we’re Britain’s best-kept secret. And those that do venture up to visit the area tend to agree. You really do get to appreciate the quality of life offered when you spend most of the working week in the capital.

The constituency was founded by the coal and steel industries, now long gone. It has left a unique mixture of urban and rural settlements, with the urban centre of Consett in the north, and the market town of Crook in the south. A network of small villages cover the constituency, each with their own character, each fiercely independent and each with their own community identity.

The main town in the constituency is Consett. High up in the Durham hills, the town was born into the steel-making business. The Consett Iron Company established a worldwide reputation for the quality of its product. The company was the town, employing its people, training up the young school-leavers, giving work to local business, and providing services and amenities to local people. Through its 100-year history, Consett developed into the largest steel works in Europe. But at the beginning of the 1980s the British Steel Consett Works closed. Over 3,700 workers lost their jobs in what remains the largest single-day redundancy in British history. It was a massive blow to the area and local people. At one stroke, most of the town’s families lost their main income and thousands of people had to look for a new career.

Over the past two decades, we have suffered a decline in the heavy industries both in the towns and in the rural areas of North West Durham. The fight back from those dark days typifies the spirit of people up here and is one of the things I’m most proud of. Commentators wrote the area off; they said that it would die as an exodus of people left the area in search of work. Whilst some had no option but to leave, many stayed behind, determined to find a future for them and their families. However, the loss of the steel and coals industries had left behind one important thing, a legacy of talent.

I’m always amazed when I visit local workplaces, at just how many of them have been started by those who left the works. They are determined to use their skills and develop modern pioneering companies. For instance, the constituency is now home to cutting edge companies in aerospace, biotechnology, chemicals, and multi-media. It has been that drive which now means that area now has the lowest unemployment for a generation and why people are optimistic about the future again.

The area is modernising; new housing, new school buildings and new hospitals have been built. The decline of the old heavy industries has given us the chance to clean up our environment and this has also had a knock on effect on health. More men now see their grandchildren grow up to get their GCSEs and A Levels; sadly this was not always the case in the past. Extra investment means that we have secured big improvements in the local health service. One of the things that pleases me the most, is that far fewer people come to see me to complain they can only get the treatment they need, in a reasonable time, if they go private.

People’s aspirations are increasing, slowly but surely. I recently visited a local factory with a predominately female workforce and found the number one issue with them wasn’t the threat of unemployment or poor working conditions but the quality of education that they wanted for their children. They aren’t prepared to accept second best when it comes to their child’s education. Local schools are improving and raising standards. Some are involved in a pioneering project that brings IT into every part of teaching, with interactive whiteboards bringing lessons to life. More and more of our young people are getting the confidence to go to university, although we still have some way to go.

It’s the government’s responsibility and my job as a local MP to make sure we can meet those new aspirations, so we remain proud of our past but able to build a new future that the next generations will able to look back on with pride.