Esther McVey

What you've seen from the 1980s, particularly in this country, is far fewer people doing Saturday jobs and doing jobs after school.

When I was growing up, my parents put money into food, utility bills, and the mortgage.

First and foremost, we have to ensure that we have to get our own kids ready for work so that employers want to take them on.

If people are coming into the country to add an extra dimension, to bring skills and expertise with them, we have always been open to that.

We never have been closed to immigration.

I come from a background where people have had their own business, where it has been incredibly tough for a long period of time, and you are only as good as the last contract you have got, as the last job you have done, where the notion of a precarious existence does exist, as it does for a lot of people.

That's what you've got to be to be an MP: a problem solver. How can I help you? How can I engage? What do you need?

I guess, as a young girl growing up in Liverpool in the '80s, when unemployment was high, my ideal job would have been to have been Minister for Employment to see, can you solve these problems? Can you get people into work?

I want to give the message that anyone can succeed given the opportunity.

Most people fall upon tough times at some point.

I always thought, as I was growing up, that I'd be married with children. That hasn't happened.

Where I come from, from a very different point of view, it's a Labour heartland, it's a trade union heartland, and I'll have a very personal campaign against me there.

What I like to see is people like Beyonce. Here is a woman who is bling-a-ding. Not only does she look like that and act like that - I've seen her perform, and I was blown away - but she is at the top of her profession.

Has my accent held me back? I don't believe it has at all. I think it can be a colourful accent.

There is a whole host of people that have got an accent like mine, whether they're from Merseyside or Wales or the North West.

When I became minister for employment, that was my ideal job because it meant I was able to reflect on what I saw growing up and actually try to change it.

Life is not a theoretical problem to be solved in class.

Life is about hard work and getting on with things.

My dad started off in scrap metal, real men doing men's jobs.

The people I believed in were people like William Lever, the great philanthropic industrialist - self-made men who realised anyone could achieve.

I was raised in inner-city Liverpool, the first in my family to go to university.

What does a teacher do in a school? A teacher would tell you off or give you lines or whatever it is, detentions, but at the same times, they are wanting your best interests at heart. They are teaching you, they are educating you, but at the same time, they will also have the ability to sanction you.

Part of the Brexit debate was about control, having a say over our laws and money and letting politicians stand up for what the people voted for, not signing away our sovereignty.

You can't underestimate how patriotic the people of this country are.

We've got to be as good as our word.

Politics is all about trust. Trust is like the soul: once gone, it never returns.

People shouldn't have to lose their accents to get a fair crack at the whip at a job or move up within a sector or industry.

For too long, people have had to neutralise or lose their accent out of fear of prejudicial treatment or to fit in. This has then led to a lack of regional accents, which has allowed this lazy stereotyping and prejudicial attitudes to prevail.

It makes my life easier that I don't have to take my daughter or son to school, that I've not got to look after them because they are ill. But then, I'm not nurtured and cherished, so I will seek external love from other close relationships.

David Cameron, and before him Iain Duncan Smith, went out of their way to attract women into the party. Yes, we need to sell politics to more women, but quotas are not the way forward. You set a quota, what is the right quota? What is the wrong quota?

I ran my first campaign when I was 11. My slogan was 'Vote McVey, vote the right way.' I've never surpassed it!

It's important to know what you can do and what you can't.

When we cannot find enough extra money for policing, yet we are having huge sums to other countries in aid, it is time to start a serious conversation.

Leaving the E.U. is an opportunity for our country.

I believe Jeremy Corbyn getting his hands on power is a risk we cannot afford to take.

We know that children living in a household with someone in work do better in school, have better educational attainment, and are more likely to have a job later in life than children growing up in a home where no one works.

I believe most people in their life will fall upon tough times at some point.

I've met people at the top of companies like Accenture who started off in McDonald's.

This is how I am. I'm happy with my friends, my family, my job.

I've had other friends who had such a burning desire to have children: they have this biological ticking clock. I don't know what happened to mine. Nobody ever wound it up.

Work experience for many is their first taste of work and an essential first step into the jobs market.

Top performers in their fields such as Debbie Moore, Jean-Christophe Novelli, Deborah Meaden and Jo Malone, did not go to university and are just a handful of the individuals who show that with drive and determination, you can succeed by treading your own path.

I'm forever being told, and intrinsically understand, that people want to study at different times in their lives, often inspired to do so when they see the practical benefits of their studies.

Every Labour government has left office with higher unemployment than when it entered.

Labour's disastrous legacy and the Conservative success did not happen by accident: it was about the choices each party made, choices that impact on everyone.

Labour parades compassion for the poor, but it practised casual cruelty by consigning millions to benefits. Yet there's nothing compassionate about being trapped on benefits, being robbed of the dignity of work, and shut out from the choices that brings.

Outside Westminster, political debate must seem like white noise that bears little relevance to people's everyday lives. But political choices made by the governments we elect have a real impact on how we live.

Everyone deserves the chance to make their own choices. The first step on this pathway is experiencing the working world.

I, for one, want to make sure we give every young person the chance to find the fuel for their confidence, something that will power their ambition.

Not only does work experience provide the opportunity to sample a potential career, but it also builds the essential skills often regarded as 'soft skills' that are needed to thrive in work.