There are a lot of things which make you very angry

Parisa Shirazi, 23

“I WORK for an MP, and I come at this question from what I’ve seen in casework. There are a lot of things which make you very angry.

When you’re working in an MP’s office a lot of things that you deal with are to do with social security and immigration cases and what I see day in and day out is that perfectly ordinary, good people are being treated with a hell of a lot of scepticism.

We see people whose benefits are being cut, people who are very ill being dragged in for disability assessments, people who are just applying for visiting visas for their family if they have a new baby in the UK and just facing blanket refusals.

So what I would like to see is less cynicism towards certain groups of people. There is a lot of scepticism towards people in the benefits system.

There seems to be a lack of appreciation of the fact that the system is paid into by everyone and it’s there if anyone needs it.

That’s what the welfare state is for –

it’s not to demonise a certain group of people.

I’ve not always been political. I grew up in Northern Ireland, apathetic towards politics.

I moved away when I was 18, studied in Durham and did my masters in Edinburgh.

I feel exhausted by Brexit. I feel like it was an enormous amount of upheaval for no gain.

It just fills me with despair. Because if you study for a law degree, as I did, you hear about things like disability rights and other rights that were brought about by being part of the EU.”