With Parliament stopping for its six-week summer break next week, I guarantee the usual rash of headlines about “Britain’s lazy MPs”.

Some of these stories imply that we do nothing during the breaks, and not much more when Parliament is sitting.

In truth – and whether you love them, or loathe them – MPs of every party are workaholics. (ask their families - I’d never marry an MP).

Here’s a brief end of year report: I’ve spoken in the Commons on 99 occasions.

Yesterday it was on Blackburn’s hospitals, and why the Prime Minister had fired his Attorney General.

On Tuesday, I made three speeches in support of the government’s emergency Bill on Data Retention and Intercept.

On Monday I questioned the Foreign Secretary about Israel’s unwarranted killing of civilians in the Gaza.

Over the year, the subjects, as this week, have ranged from the very local – including our train services, and fracking – to the international.

The single most important speech I’ve made was on August 29 last year, against British military intervention in Syria.

I’ve made six overseas visits as MP – to Iran, Israel and Palestine, Stockholm, twice to Turkey (I’m co-chairman of the British-Turkish Forum), and to Vienna.

The Vienna trip was principally to talk to the International Atomic Energy Agency, based there, about Iran.

But I used the opportunity to lobby senior Austrian MPs about EU proposals initiated by the Austrian government which could adversely affect UK, and in particular East Lancashire, businesses.

That emphasises how much work, above all for my constituency, can be done behind the scenes.

Then there’s my constituency caseload, picked up from the fifty-plus walk-in advice surgeries, from calls and emails to my excellent staff in town, regular ward residents’ meetings, and from workplace visits.

We have around 1,400 active cases a year. Some are straightforward; many not. One case has been going for ten years. Some business problems, especially with banks, are hugely complex.

Parliament meets again on September 1. Fear not, though, after a family holiday, I'll be back working from the second week of August.