MPs from all parties have begun to sign a Commons motion expressing “great alarm” at plans by the education secretary Michael Gove to remove Victorian heroine Mary Seacole from the schools curriculum.
16 MPs have so far signed the Early Day Motion (EDM) with more promising to sign next week. You can view the EDM here.
The campaign to keep Seacole in the textbooks as already attracted 33,000 public signatures and support from a host of celebrities including author Zadie Smith, playwright Kwame Kwei-Armah, civil rights leader Rev Jesse Jackson Snr and the Archbishop of York John Sentamu.
The Mary Seacole Campaign are now encouraging people to lobby their MP’s to sign the EDM – number 919 – to increase pressure on Gove to have a change of heart.
MP’s who have signed the motion so far are:
Alan Meale Mansfield Labour
Diane Abbott Hackney North and Stoke Newington Labour
Peter Bottomley Worthing West Conservative
Jim Shannon Strangford DUP
Lady Hermon North Down Independent
Kelvin Hopkins Luton North Labour
Steve Rotheram Liverpool, Walton Labour
Virendra Sharma Ealing, Southall Labour
Stephen Williams Bristol West Liberal Democrat
Hugh Bayley York Central Labour
Ronnie Campbell Blyth Valley Labour
Martin Caton Gower Labour
George Galloway Bradford West Respect
John Leech Manchester, Withington Liberal Democrat
Jeremy Corbyn Islington North Labour
Jim McGovern Dundee West Labour
Please find below a model letter for you to email to your local MP asking them to sign toe EDM, which you can adapt and personalise as you see fit.
You can find contact details of your MP on www.theyworkforyou.com – there’s a facility on the homepage.
MODEL LETTER
Dear (insert name) MP
I am writing to you as a constituent to ask that you support the campaign to keep Mary Seacole on the national curriculum. The Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove has proposed that Mary Seacole be removed. A nurse, born in Jamaica, Mary Seacole traveled to the Crimea to tend wounded solidiers at her own expense and returned to Britain as a national heroine. She was recently voted the Greatest Black Britain.
The government’s proposal has been met with outrage by the public with over 32000 people signing a petition on change.org calling on Michael Gove to keep Mary Seacole on the Curriculum and a recent open letter in The Times signed by over 50 well known personalities including members of Parliament.
I am requesting that you support the campaign by signing the petition http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/michael-gove-secretary-of-state-for-education-keep-mary-seacole-on-the-national-curriculum and signing Early Day Motion 919 tabled by Alan Meale MP.
EDM number 919 in 2012-13, proposed by Alan Meale on 15/01/2013.
That this House is aware of history which records the many heroic and compassionate acts carried out unselfishly by renowned war nursing heroine Mary Seacole for innumerable wounded soldiers injured on the Crimean War’s bloody battlefields; notes her efforts have rightly become part of the nation’s schools educational curriculum with further recognition of her contribution shortly to be revealed by the unveiling of a large bronze statue in her memory to be erected in the grounds of St Thomas’ Hospital facing the Houses of Parliament; is therefore greatly alarmed by reports that the Secretary of State for Education has announced plans to overhaul the core history content taught to our nation’s schoolchildren which won’t include the story of her exploits on behalf of others; reminds the Minister that at the age of 50 years she paid her own way to the front to help establish a center to administer the sick and tended to the wounded on the battlefield throughout the war much of the time under bombardment, brave and caring acts which led to her being little rewarded for all of her distinguished service in the field as she returned to Britain impoverished and had to declare bankruptcy; and believes the nation and its children are best served by being reminded of such unselfishness and hopes the Secretary of State will desist in his attempt to undermine her memory.
Yours sincerely
