This week has seen the historic visit to the UK Parliament by President Zelenskyy, and his address to both Houses of Parliament in Westminster Hall. It was a privilege to be there to hear his words and his call for wings to protect Ukraine's freedom.
Inevitably his visit knocked some of the Parliamentary programme off schedule, but my Select Committee took evidence late on Wednesday from women working in the music industry. It was useful to hear their views on the omission of any women nominees in the Best Artist category at this weekend's Brit Awards. More hideous was their commentary about why women do not report assaults at music events. One of the reasons cited was a lack of trust in the Police, a devastating analysis.
This week we saw the sentencing of former Metropolitan Police Officer David Carrick, and a media round asking me if I was satisfied with the sentence. He will not be eligible for parole until he is 78 years old, but his victim's sentences will last forever. Our thoughts should be with them at this time, and also making sure Sir Mark Rowley overhauls Police vetting.
I managed to get into a very heavily oversubscribed debate on autism on Monday. When I was still a Minister I did some autism awareness training at the behest of the PM and our wonderful late colleague Dame Cheryl Gillan. There are still too many challenges in getting the support people with autism need and it was good to see Westminster Hall so packed to debate what can be done to help.