Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if he will amend the remit of the taskforce created to respond to the closure of SSI in Redcar to include the Teesside economy as a whole.

Where there are redundancies within the Tees Valley, the Government will work with local partners, including the Tees Valley Combined Authority, the Local Enterprise Partnership and the SSI Task Force to determine how support can be most effectively targeted to affected individuals. The SSI Task Force is already supporting the Tees Valley economy more broadly, for example through the £16m Support for Businesses Schemes, which the Task Force reports has created 186 jobs, safeguarded 326 jobs and committed £4.1m funding, attracting £6m in private sector match.