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Parliament is intimidating and “reeks of the establishment and of power”, a newly-elected MP has said.

North West Durham MP Laura Pidcock made the observation in her first speech as an MP in the House of Commons.

And she said Parliament appeared to have been deliberately designed to hark back to days when women and working class people were excluded.

Ms Pidcock was elected as a Labour MP in the June 8 General Election after former North West Durham MP Pat Glass stood down.

In her maiden speech in the Commons, she told fellow MPs: “Turning to this place, this building is intimidating.

“It reeks of the establishment and of power; its systems are confusing - some may say archaic - and it was built at a time when my class and my sex would have been denied a place within it because we were deemed unworthy.

(Image: Newcastle Chronicle)

“I believe that the intimidating nature of this place is not accidental. The clothes, the language, and the obsession with hierarchies, control and domination are symbolic of the system at large.

“But the most frustrating thing has been to sit opposite those people who tell me that things are better, and that suffering has lessened for my constituents.

“I would like them to come and tell the people who have been sanctioned that things are better. I would like them to tell that to the teacher in my constituency who was recently made redundant. I would like them to talk to the 16,500 people in County Durham in receipt of food parcels.

“I would like them to talk to the nurses, the junior doctors and the firefighters — come and tell them that years of austerity have improved their practice or their profession.”

She paid tribute to her predecessor, saying: “If I can be half the friend and ally of schools in North West Durham that Pat Glass has been, I will be doing very well.”

(Image: Newcastle Chronicle)

Ms Pidcock also told MPs she was “truly blessed” to be representing North West Durham, saying: “The green, lush countryside is simply breathtaking, peppered with arable, dairy and upland hill farms; the richness of our culture and history is astounding; and the people are hard workers, proud and strong.

“Some in here would have us in the north painted as uncultured and without finesse - as savages - but people only think that or say that because they do not know our communities or our people.

“My constituents are the real wealth creators, and they are people who make this nation great.”

Ms Pidcock, aged 29, has previously spoken about her struggle to buy a home, saying that affording a deposit is “out of reach” even on her £76,000 MP salary, because of debt from university.

She said in a BBC interview that she “would love a council house” but has to rent in the private sector instead.