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A 26-year-old new Labour MP has called for an end to "40 years of Thatcherism" in a damning first speech in Parliament.

Zarah Sultana broke with the tradition of being light-hearted in her maiden speech to slam not just the Tories' record - but events on Tony Blair's watch too.

In an address to fellow MPs she said: "Ten years ago I was sitting my GCSEs at school. I was a teenager and I never dreamed I would be here today.

"In ten years’ time, at the start of the the next decade, I want to look teenagers in the eye and say with pride - my generation faced 40 years of Thatcherism and we ended it.

"We faced rising racism and we defeated it. We faced a planet in peril - we saved it. We have our work cut out but together we can do it."

Ex-PM Margaret Thatcher, who took power 41 years ago and changed the political landscape of the UK away from the state and towards the private sector, once claimed Tony Blair and New Labour were her greatest achievement.

But defenders of Labour's time in office from 1997 to 2010 point out the party introduced the minimum wage, Sure Start centres, devolution, school and hospital funding and many more.

(Image: Parliament Live)

During the election Ms Sultana apologised for a tweet five years ago that said she would celebrate the deaths of Mr Blair, Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu and former US President George Bush.

The 2015 Twitter post in her name published by the Jewish Chronicle said: "'Don't "celebrate" the death of any person regardless of what they did.' Try & stop me when the likes of Blair, Netanyahu and Bush die."

Another post said: "Those within the student movement who go to Zionist conferences and trips should be ashamed of themselves. You’re advocating racist ideology."

She said the posts dating to her student days were "written out of frustration rather than any malice".

Ms Sultana held Coventry South for Labour in last month's election, but with a majority slashed from 7,947 to 401.

Ms Sultana also used today's speech to call for MPs to set up Parliament in Coventry when they are forced to leave the Palace of Westminster for renovation work.

The MP, whose family moved to the UK from Kashmir, today said her generation had been betrayed by almost a decade of Tory austerity.

She told the House of Commons: "I know convention is for maiden speeches to avoid saying anything members opposite will find disagreeable.

"But I can’t do that.

"Because my generation has only ever faced a future of rising rents, frozen wages and diminishing opportunities.

"For my whole adult life I’ve only known Tory governments that wage war on working-class communities like mine.

"Cutting our services, underfunding our schools and hospitals, saddling me and my generation with tens of thousands of pounds of student debt."

She said the earth is “teetering on the brink of ruin”, adding: “The climate crisis is a capitalist crisis and the climate struggle is a class struggle across borders”.

And slamming Boris Johnson's past columns, she said: "The gap between the ruling class and the working class has widened and is widening. And the response from members opposite is as it always has been - to divide and rule.

"That’s what’s happening when they compare Muslim women to bank robbers.

"When they call gay men tank-topped bum boys. And when they blame events like the Hillsborough disaster on drunken fans.

"I’m a working class Muslim woman and I know the Bullingdon boys will never be on my side.

“And they will never be on the side of the shop stewards in Coventry, the cleaners in Carlisle, migrant workers in Manchester or teachers in Tottenham.”