Next week, Parliament returns from its summer recess. The familiar sights of politics - Prime Minister’s Questions, parliamentary debates and usual political discourse - will be back in full swing.

By the time the General Election was called in July, the Conservatives had long given up doing the hard work needed to govern. We have all seen the consequences for our economy and our public services.

However, the winds of change are already being felt. The day after the General Election, the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, stood on the steps of Downing Street to address the nation for the first time in his new role. He promised that his Labour government would not lean on division, distraction or short-termism. He promised a different politics, one that put Westminster firmly back in the service of working people.

Throughout the election campaign, we were honest about the challenges that faced us as an incoming government, and collectively as a country. We all knew that turning around 14 years of decline under the Conservatives would not be an overnight fix.

In fact, the rot at the heart of the previous government left by the previous administration was far worse than any of us imagined. Don’t just take my word for it - the independent Office for Budget Responsibility even said so.

Yet, the scale of the challenge is no excuse to shy away from it. Tough decisions lie ahead, but so does a brighter future if we can rebuild our country’s foundations.

The scale of the challenge was laid bare by the disgraceful scenes of violence across Britain in recent weeks. Attacks on police, the looting of shops and Nazi salutes by the Cenotaph; I agree with the Prime Minister that this was little more than ‘organised, far-right thuggery’.

On a broad level, these riots also exposed the terrible consequences of a decade-and-a-half of decline, division and disorder that Britain has suffered. The last Conservative government allowed prisons to reach capacity, slashed police numbers, and people were able to act with impunity.

Every time they faced a difficult decision, they shied away from it. Working people carried the can, as the previous administration turned away and slumped back into its performative rituals of distraction and populism.

This cocktail of incompetence and chaos is what our new government has inherited. Not just an economic black hole, but a societal one, too. One where ordinary working people have lost trust that Westminster can effectively respond to their concerns and represent their interests.

I am fully committed to turning this desperate situation around. I was elected on a platform of change; one that rejected economic recklessness and societal division; one that promised to put the interests of ordinary, hard-working people first; one that promised to unlock our town’s potential.

So, however hard the path ahead may be, I will not stray from it. Because, I know failure is not abstract, but has real-life consequences for people here in Ipswich and across the country.

On Monday, the work of our new government continues at pace, carrying on where we left off before the summer: protecting taxpayers’ money, building 1.5 million homes, bringing rail services into public ownership, harnessing the potential of the green transition with Great British Energy, implementing the biggest boost to workers’ rights in a generation, and getting our NHS back on its feet.

Though tough decisions loom, we will not lose sight of the fact that our government promised to restore hope and pride. And we will.

No more gimmicks. No more performative politics. No more division.

This is a government committed to returning politics to public service.

Jack Abbott is Labour MP for Ipswich