Wes Streeting has revealed how a childhood plagued by poverty, crime and abuse spurred him to be a politician.
In his new memoir, the Labour MP for Ilford North charts his extraordinary journey from the East End to Cambridge University and Westminster.
The Shadow Health Secretary recalls how his teenage mum was too poor to afford a cot for him and he was forced to leave home because of her abusive boyfriend.
In exclusive extracts from One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry-Up, he says he owes his success to a loving family and Labour policies such as the welfare state and health service, adding: “Now I have the chance to give something back, to improve the future of kids like me.”
I owe my life to a fry-up
What do you mean you’re not going through with it?” Nan said, her voice going up an octave.
I’ve eaten breakfast. I can’t go now. And I’m keeping it, anyway,” Mum replied nonchalantly, putting the breakfast dishes away.
All hell broke loose. Until that moment, Nan had greeted the news of her daughter’s pregnancy much like everyone else in the family: with shock and disbelief but also a level-headed focus on solving the problem.
Now that Mum was unsolving the problem, Libby blew a gasket. “Don’t think I’m looking after it either!” Nanny Libby threatened. “You made your bed, you lie in it!” “I will,” said Mum, with the defiance I owe my life to.
Unlike her mother, who wouldn’t carry through with her threats, Mum remained resolute.
A month earlier, on April 7, Corrina Anne Crowley had turned 18. Pictures from that night show Mum looking stunning in a black all-in-one suit and a bright red belt; her blonde curls were cut short and her huge smile lit up the room.
"Also there that night was a boy named Mark – a boy who would soon become Dad.
He was six foot tall, with dark brown hair swept to one side, bright blue eyes, and rosy-red cheeks that betrayed his youth.
He had only turned 17 two months earlier in February and was there to celebrate his girlfriend’s birthday.
When Mum finally confessed to Dad that she wasn’t going to go through with the abortion, he gave her an ultimatum. If she didn’t get rid of the baby, it would be the end of their relationship.
Mum chose to keep me. Ultimately, it was her decision. But Dad was there for me in the hospital and he’s been there ever since..
I cannot imagine what my mum went through
Mum started seeing Lenny when I was around two years old. He seemed like a nice guy at first, but appearances can be deceptive.
Underneath the charming exterior was a violent, controlling brute, and my mother was on the receiving end of his terrible abuse.
Mum made sure Lenny never hurt me, but it was the threat of harm that led her to hand me over to the care of Dad and Grandad temporarily while she tried to extract herself from the relationship.
She had grown up in a household where domestic violence occurred, and she was determined to protect me from experiencing what she had.
On one occasion, he dangled Mum’s 13-year-old sister Eve over the balcony and threatened to drop her three storeys to the ground below as Mum looked on in horror.
The worst incident of all, perhaps the most painful for Mum to recount, and the hardest for a son to write about, was when she was abducted by Lenny.
When she told him that the relationship was over, he took the news badly.
On her 21st birthday, Mum was dragged from the street in Stepney Way and taken to his dingy flat, where she was held hostage for 24 hours.
Thanks to several dutiful police officers, the courage of my mother and her younger sister Eve, who bravely testified in court, Lenny was ultimately brought to justice.
He received a custodial sentence and, thankfully, a dark chapter in Mum’s life was closed.
I cannot imagine what she went through, but I do know that, like so many other women trapped in abusive and violent relationships, it took a hell of a lot of courage to escape and to put him behind bars.
Deafening thump on our front door
Making the flat feel like a home fit for a small child wasn’t all plain sailing. One particular night – rather, in the early hours of the morning – Mum heard what was at first a muffled disturbance outside, but which then escalated into deafening thumping on our front door.
All of a sudden, in stormed police officers who stood at the bottom of our stairs with their guns trained on her.
Hands raised as best she could and shaking, elbows glued to her waist, she slowly crept down the narrow staircase as instructed, stammering, ‘My son…my son… he…he’s…upstairs in his bedroom sleeping…please, please don’t hurt him…’ I was out for the count and none the wiser. It turned out they weren’t expecting to find us there at all.
They were on the lookout for a dangerous criminal on the run and 22 Clichy House had been the last address they’d had for him."
There wasn't a fiddle to keep the electricity running
Our flat’s electricity meter was relatively modern, which meant that, unlike Mum’s days at Bengal House, when they put a wire in the meter to stop it from counting accurately, there wasn’t a fiddle to keep the electricity running when the money ran out, which it often did.
All the lights would go out, the TV screen would switch to black or the stereo would cut out mid-song, leaving us in pitch-black silence, with only the sound of police sirens in the distance or ambient noise from the neighbours above, below and either side of our flat.
At school, I realised, to my dismay and embarrassment, that I needed to join a separate queue to collect my ‘dinner ticket’ for my free school meal. While other members of my class joined the queue for their lunch, I trudged over to the back of another pretty lengthy line and felt my cheeks flush and my stomach grumble in protest.
I made an effort to keep my chin up but I noticed a few of the other skinny boys in oversized uniforms ahead of me looking sheepishly over their shoulders at the rest of the kids.
I knew exactly what they were thinking – wondering if they were being judged for not being able to afford to pay for a hot meal.
Had I known what ‘stigmatising’ meant when I was 11, I’m sure I would have used it to describe the experience.
Days off because we couldn't afford the Tube fare
I had just entered my second year at Westminster City. Mum agreed that I could continue commuting into school from Epping, but this was a ridiculously long journey, made worse by the unreliability of the Central Line.
On a good day, this was one hour and twenty minutes each way; on a bad day, it was an hour and forty. An eternity, even by the standards of London commuting.
I still had a Travelcard for zones one and two that had been awarded by Tower Hamlets Council, but as we were now living at the end of the tube network, Mum had to top up the fares.
Most days this was fine, but as we drew closer to Christmas and money became scarce, I had days off school because she couldn’t afford the fares.
Chances for children from backgrounds like mine are worsening
That boy from Stepney is still there. His experiences drive and motivate me: my values, my politics, and the things I still want to achieve.
My life is so different now. I’m proud of my working-class roots but I lead a middle-class life. I have a mortgage. I have savings. I have financial security for the first time in my life.
I wish I could tell you that the opportunities I’ve had are available to everyone. That all we need to do is pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and we can make it. That poverty is a choice, not a trap. That we live in a classless society. That things can only get better.
But experience says otherwise. I am afraid that the chances for children from backgrounds like mine are worsening.
One Boy, Two Bills and a Fry Up: A Memoir of Growing Up and Getting On by Wes Streeting, to be published on 29th June by Hodder & Stoughton.
Read more extracts here: Wes on coming out as gay, starting out in politics, and his shocking cancer diagnosis.
