Naz Shah: Bradford MP shares extraordinary personal story in Commons while proposing King's Speech
Naz Shah, the Labour MP for Bradford West, revealed she was the first Muslim to propose the King’s Speech, saying: “I would never have been given such an honour in any other country.”
A backbench MP spoke of Bradford’s “history of extraordinary women” when proposing the King’s Speech, while also revealing her own powerful story.
As is tradition, two backbenchers start the debate in the House of Commons, with humorous and personal statements.
Naz Shah, the Labour MP for Bradford West, revealed she was the first Muslim to propose the King’s Speech, saying: “I would never have been given such an honour in any other country.”
She spoke of her “constituency with a history of extraordinary women, who broke every barrier that the patriarchy put in front of them”.
Ms Shah cited the Bronte sisters who “changed English literature forever, but had to use men’s names to publish their writing”.
She said: “The Suffragettes of Bradford went to Holloway Prison for the right to vote. The women of Manningham Mills walked out into the cold changing our political landscape forever.
“Margaret McMillian pioneered free school meals that were trialled in 1904 in the school I attended - Green Lane Primary.”
She added: “Barbara Castle - shaped by Bradford’s streets and schools - went on to write equal pay into law.”
Ms Shah praised the district’s fellow female MPs, Shipley’s Anna Dixon and Bradford South’s Judith Cummins, saying: “There is something in the air in Bradford as a whole, something that produces women who will not be told.”
Later on in her speech, Ms Shah got to her own extraordinary story. When she was younger, the MP was arrested alongside her mother, Zoora Shah, who was convicted in 1993 of murdering her abuser Mohammed Azam by poisoning him with arsenic.
While Naz was released without charge, her mother was given a 20-year sentence. It was only later she found out that Azam had been raping her mother.
Speaking in the House of Commons this afternoon, Ms Shah said: “For someone like me, who spent her formative years fighting a campaign to release her mother from prison, who did not have a formal education beyond the age of 12, spelling, grammar and parliamentary language and phrases don’t come naturally.
“Forced into a marriage at 15, forced to live a life with hearing aids, lugging a black binliner of belongings as a homeless teenagers, left all alone as a guardian to a younger brother and sister without a shoulder of support or stability in life.
“Attempting suicide as I couldn’t see a way out from my despair, yet here I stand with the world’s eyes watching the state opening of Parliament … if this was not my story I would only believe it to be fiction”.
In her speech, Ms Shah also compared Sir Keir Starmer to Labour Party founder, Keir Hardie.
She said: “It was in Bradford that a man named Keir first took the chair of the Labour movement. And despite 130 years, two world wars and roughly 47 leadership elections, the party remains in the hands of a Keir.
“Prime Minister, nobody can say that you don’t know how to fight on.”
Later, in his speech, Sir Keir said: “The gracious speech was brilliantly proposed by my honourable friend, the member for Bradford West (Naz Shah).
“Members across the House will have read her remarkable new book. Her list of endorsements is truly impressive, reaching well over 100 members – at last, a list that we could all get behind.”