Levelling Up

Debate between Michael Shanks and Jacob Young

Monday 20th November 2023 Commons Chamber

[Jacob Young]

My hon. Friend is an amazing champion for Darlington. Without him, the great work that we are doing in levelling up in Darlington would not be happening. That includes: the investment that we are making into Darlington rail station; the investment that the Treasury has made, bringing new civil service jobs to Darlington; the buying back of Teesside airport by Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen; and the Darlington town deal. All those things are dependent on my hon. Friend, who is a fantastic champion for Darlington, and his former council leader, Councillor Jonathan Dulston, who has done an amazing job. I will continue to work with him and others to level up across the Tees Valley.

[Michael Shanks (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab)]

My first correspondence to the Government since being elected was to ask the Secretary of State to look again at the levelling-up bid for Shawfield in my constituency. I am delighted that, after only a month in this place, he has awarded £14 million to that project. It will be a challenge to keep that up, I suspect. This is a really important project, which not only unlocks huge investment in my constituency but clears up a toxic legacy where, in the 19th century, the world’s largest chemical factory once was. It will make a huge difference to my constituency.

The Minister has been asked a number of times to reflect on the costs for local authorities in coming up with these bids, and I do not think that we have had an answer yet. As part of his review, will he look at those significant costs? I know that organisations in my constituency such as Clyde Gateway and South Lanarkshire Council spent huge amounts of time, expertise and money pulling together bids, which they then thought were dead; now they realise that the project has a second chance. Will he think about the total costs involved and reimburse local authorities for them?

[Jacob Young]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for welcoming this funding. I am sure his letter to the Secretary of State had a key decision-making role in that. We are making capacity funding available within the Department to help local authorities where they come up against further challenges in the delivery of these projects. As he has rightly identified, these projects were submitted some time ago, so adjustments will need to be made. I cannot give refunds, unfortunately, but our funding simplification programme is all about ensuring that we step forward to a simpler version of funding that meets councils’ needs, rather than asking councils to meet the needs of various funding streams.