There are thousands of Early Day Motions (EDMs) backed every year but hardly any get debated.

Given that the effectiveness of EDMs is diluted by their sheer volume and the system costs hundreds of thousands of pounds per year to administer, many MPs, myself included, believe they are not an effective use of Parliamentary resources and so will not sign them as a matter of principle.

However, this does not mean that MPs do not take the issues contained in them seriously. I often take up constituent's concerns in other ways, such as writing directly to Ministers, raising it in written questions or in the House of Commons.