Christmas flew by with highlights being the packed Christmas Eve service in my local church and the festive, albeit last- minute, shopping trips to local high streets for a great array of gifts. We had a wonderful celebration but the festivities were overshadowed for me by concern for the thousands of rail passengers who faced travel disruption when engineering works overran on two of the projects being worked upon over the holidays – London’s Paddington and King’s Cross.

This government is making a huge financial investment in the railways which can cause some delays. This was the heaviest engineering schedule over Christmas for many a year and 95 per cent of the 2,000 projects carried out were completed on time.

But I found it completely unacceptable that so little travel information and support was given to the affected people trying to get home after the holidays. Enquiries have been launched and lessons will be learned but, along with the Secretary of State for Transport, I am determined to do all I can to get a better service for passengers who choose to travel by train and to get the rail industry focused on those who use the service rather than those who manage it.

My New Year was spent in Newcastle, which was buzzing with economic vigour, and in Northumberland where we took several wintry hikes along parts of Hadrian’s Wall to blow the cobwebs away. Given the atrocious weather I could see why this was considered a hardship posting by Legionnaires of old – even the local sheep looked a tough bunch – but it was a wonderful visit to an unmissable piece of history. I am now back at my Westminster desk and preparing for a busy election year.

The economy is moving in the right direction and the main question for voters I think will be who you trust to manage our country’s finances for the long term. I am incredibly proud of what this Conservative -led government has achieved so far and more convinced than ever that the only way to guarantee a strong economy, secure Britain’s future for our children and pay for vital services like the NHS is to return a Conservative government in May. I hope that you feel the same. Tomorrow I will be holding my first drop-in surgery of 2015 at Tesco, Marlborough from 4.30pm-5.30pm, so please pop along.