early day motion

Had an interesting lunchtime today.

The Member of Parliament for Leeds North West (which includes Otley), Greg Mulholland has been in fairly regular contact over the past few weeks regarding my Run To London.  He's a runner himself and completed a marathon at the beginning of May.  Anyway the point is that he recently felt compelled to mention my Run To London in the House of Commons in the form of an Early Day Motion.

For those who are unfamiliar with the workings of the UK Parliament the official website states that:

"Early Day Motions (EDMs) are formal motions submitted for debate in the House of Commons.  However, very few EDMs are actually debated.  Instead, they are used for reasons such as publicising the views of individual MPs, drawing attention to specific events or campaigns, and demonstrating the extent of parliamentary support for a particular cause or point of view.  An MP can add their signature to an EDM to show their support.  They can also submit amendments to an existing EDM."

Today, at noon, I met Greg Mulholland and the Otley Town Mayor (Councillor Gerard Francis) and was presented with a framed copy of the wording of the Early day motion.

• That this House congratulates Mr Chris Carver on the extraordinary achievement of completing a 218 mile run from Otley to London; further congratulates Mr Carver on managing to raise over £2,000 for the charity Orchid, a cancer charity dedicated to preventing, diagnosing and treating male cancers; is hugely impressed that he managed to complete this challenge in just under 45 hours and recognises the physical and mental discipline as well as intensive training that is required to complete such an impressive example of ultra distance running; and wishes him every success in his future endeavours, including the Commonwealth 24 hour Championships which takes place in September.
  

Very impressed that my fundraising and ultra distance running exploits seem to have reached an audience of MPs - unexpected though.  In some ways it's all a bit strange; doesn't the UK Parliament have more important work to do other than briefly talking about people such as myself.  Funding research into the prevention and treatment of cancer for example.