On Thursday evening, Commons Speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle turned on the Ayrton Light above Big Ben to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War blackouts. In peacetime, the lantern light always shone out after sunset in order to show that the House of Commons was at work. Report by Jonesia. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
00:00In peacetime, the lantern light above Big Ben always shone out after sunset in order to show that the House of Commons was at work.
00:10For five years, seven months, twenty-three days, this light has now been extinguished.
00:17When I press the switch on, the lantern light will shine once more.
00:21In doing so, I pray that with God's blessing, the light will shine henceforth, not only as an outward and visible sign,
00:30but that Parliament of Free People is assembled in free debate, but also that it may shine as a beacon of sure hope.
00:40In a sadly torn, distracting world, I now turn on our lantern light.
00:51Tonight matters so much. It's eight years when this light was switched back on.
01:13This was showing that democracy and freedom have survived the Second World War.
01:18And this, of course, brings us all together to remember those that paid the ultimate sacrifice as well.
01:24The fact that Parliament could sit and it could tell London and the world that the war has now come to the end.
01:31I hate heights.
01:45That's why I did parachuting, because I realised that the only way to cure fear is to do something which you don't want to do.
02:01It was a different world.
02:06We started to reunite families again that had been separated and split up because of young children going to different places in the country away from their parents.
02:16It was nice to see.
02:18And the street parties, of course.
02:20Obviously, children remember the street parties in a big way.
02:24You know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know.
