Economic Development (North-East)

Ian Swales Excerpts

Tuesday 15th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Brown]

My hon. Friend is right. The theme of my speech is that we had got the structures and the working relationships right between us. There was a real feeling that we were getting somewhere.

[Ian Swales (Redcar) (LD)]

Is it not a matter of regret to the right hon. Gentleman that Middlesbrough, Hartlepool and Redcar and Cleveland were recently rated as being in the bottom 10 in economic strength out of 324 areas in the country? Does not that give weight to the Government’s policy of creating Teesside local enterprise partnership?

[Mr Brown]

We all understand how difficult things are on Teesside, and I have lent my shoulder to tackling those problems, just as other hon. Members across the region have done. However, it is my strong view that we need a single, regional approach rather than allowing our efforts to become fragmented. In particular, it is a terrible mistake to say to those with the most difficult problems—I will say something about the specifics shortly—“You have to sort your own problems out without the help of the rest of us.” The great strength of our region is that we have all stood together, geographically and across party politics, public sector and private sector, including the public sector agencies that are not directly politically led. We have all stood together with the same focus, in an earnest endeavour to work together to give a coherent single voice to government for the good of the region. That is the correct approach.

--- Later in debate ---

[Roberta Blackman-Woods]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. We know that County Durham’s economy has suffered through the recession and we see few plans coming from this Government to correct the situation.

It is possible to argue that our region is well placed to become a centre of green energy production and green manufacturing, but for that to happen we need to continue to develop our skills base and there are worrying signs that that is faltering. I wrote to the Business Secretary asking what was going to happen to regional skills strategies, because they have been crucial for the north-east in developing the areas where we needed to reskill the population. The letter I received from the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning said:

“The Government no longer…expects Regional Skills Partnerships to produce skills strategies”

or even to meet. He said that instead the work should be undertaken by local enterprise partnerships, which represent the correct “geographies”. A number of us would query whether LEPs are the right level for discussing the skills needs of the region and for being able to identify opportunities for upskilling the population. This is extremely worrying, because we need to continue to invest in basic scientific research skills and in how to apply them to manufacturing.

[Ian Swales]

Can the hon. Lady give an example of how a regional skills strategy would deliver something new? She has just expressed what the strategy needs to be, but what else do we need to know?

[Roberta Blackman-Woods]

The hon. Gentleman has to realise that within the umbrella of green energy and manufacturing, many different skills are needed. The regional skills strategy was able to bring together universities, employers and the further education sector. They could then decide between them who was best placed to deliver those skills, but the structure that enabled that to happen has simply been removed. The Government are telling us that there is no need for those strategies, but I dispute that.