Levelling-up Agenda: Tees Valley

Dehenna Davison Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Dehenna Davison (Bishop Auckland) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Cummins. I thank the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) for securing this debate. Before I start, I have had messages from my hon. Friends the Members for Darlington (Peter Gibson), for Stockton South (Matt Vickers) and for Redcar (Jacob Young), who really wanted to be here but are doing their duty and self-isolating, so I just want to put that on record.

Just last week I was in this Chamber emphasising the importance of levelling up, and I am delighted to be able to do so again. The levelling-up agenda is really at the heart of my politics and the reason that I am in this place. It means changing lives for the better, allowing businesses to flourish and those held back by the circumstances to fulfil their potential and grasp opportunities.

Yet time and time again, when we are talking about levelling up across the country, including in the north-east, we see the Opposition talk it down. While we drive investment in transport, in industry and in green technology, the Opposition talk it down—[Interruption.] They are trying to do it right now. We focus on creating opportunities for the future, but instead, the hon. Members for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) and for Hartlepool (Mike Hill) hark back to the past, talking about Margaret Thatcher and events under her premiership—things that happened before I and many of their constituents were even born.

We are about the future; Labour are about the past. For too long, the Opposition have taken people such as my constituents for granted. They believed it was their right to represent seats such as mine in the north-east, yet for decades under local Labour leadership our region saw nothing but decline—but then came the light. Leading the Tees Valley Combined Authority, Ben Houchen has shown that the levelling-up agenda is also at the heart of his mission.

The Tees Valley has an extraordinary champion in Ben Houchen, someone who has been fighting for the area from day one. Though my constituency is not within the Tees Valley Combined Authority area, Teesside’s success means more opportunities for constituents of mine in Bishop Auckland, and although geography means that they cannot vote for him, my constituents certainly have a lot of very kind words to say about Ben Houchen, and Labour needs to take note of that.

I was planning to say a lot more, but I want to keep it brief to allow my hon. Friend the Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) a go. The short point is that we are delivering, after years and years of Labour’s talking the area down and doing little to deliver for the communities it claims to represent. We are delivering, and that is the reason why Opposition Members hate it so much.