THE MP for Torfaen has spoken of his pride at representing the borough in which he was born and grew up in one year on from his election.

Nick Thomas-Symonds succeeded Paul Murphy, now Lord Murphy, at the general election in May 2015.

In the last year year, the Labour politician has succeeded in helping to create a new law relating to cancer drugs, which he believes is his greatest achievement.

“The off-label drugs bill is the one thing which I think pleases me the most since I became the MP,” said the shadow employment minister.

“It’s extraordinarily difficult as an opposition MP to change a piece of law. For the reason that in the UK, the government controls the legislative programme.

“It was such a rollercoaster to get to that point. On November 6, the bill was talked out in very controversial circumstances. There was quite a backlash in the media, especially on social media, about that,” he added.

Aspects of the bill put forward by Torfaen MP received royal assent in March after the measures cross-party support from Conservative and SNP MPs.

Despite the success of the off-patent cancer drugs bill and becoming a member of the opposition's front bench, becoming a member of parliament has its difficulties, according to the Torfaen MP.

“What I find unquestionably most difficult is being away from my family in the week,” said Mr Thomas-Symonds.

“I’ve got two daughters, aged four and six, at the moment and I have a son due in September.”

“Being away from them, along with my wife, from Monday to Thursday is hard. But also you are so busy in parliament, sometimes you don’t have votes until 10 o’clock so in a sense you are working in the evenings anyway,” he added.

Mr Thomas-Symonds paid tribute to his predecessor, adding that he has set the bar and the standard to which the current Torfaen MP feels he has to aim for, while always making himself available for his constituents.

“It is a great honour to follow on from Paul (Lord Murphy) but I see it in the sense that Paul has set very high standards,” he said.

“I see it as my role to maintain and meet those standards over the years to come. I believe that Paul did a great deal for Torfaen and see it as my job to continue that.”