Paul Howell, MP for Sedgefield, states again the importance of investing in transport, especially bus services and the rail network, following release of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Coalfield Communities report into its Inquiry “Next Steps in Levelling Up the Former Coalfields” on 12th June 2023.
The Inquiry, initiated last November, received more than 70 submissions from across England, Scotland and Wales, including from local authorities, the voluntary and community sector, and the Scottish and Welsh Governments.
At the forefront of the report’s recommendations is the need to boost local economies. The report says that trickle-down from the big cities is failing the former coalfields, which mostly cover smaller towns and communities.
With a combined population of 5.7 million – roughly the same as a typical English region and more than the whole of Scotland – the former coalfields are too big to ignore, says the report. They include places of acute disadvantage, and though unemployment has fallen economic inactivity remains widespread.
The State of the Coalfields report for example, by academics at Sheffield Hallam University, found that the former coalfields have only 55 employee jobs per 100 residents of working age, compared to a national average of 73 and 84 in the main regional cities.
In addition to calling for stronger policies to grow the local economies of the former coalfields the report calls for:
• Investment in transport, particularly local rail
• More high-quality apprenticeships
• Monies returned to the Treasury to be used to fund small business
units
• Geothermal mine water to be investigated as a source of green
energy
• Longer-term levelling up funding, allocated by formula not bidding
• A higher share of miners’ pension fund surpluses to go to retirees
• UK Government funding for coal tip safety in Wales
• A better deal for the coalfields from Lottery funding.
Paul Howell MP (Conservative, Sedgefield) member of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee during the Mineworkers’ Pension Scheme Report of Session 2019–21 and Co-Chair of APPG for ‘Left Behind’ Neighbourhoods, said: “Investment in bus services and reopening the Leamside line is an integral part of delivering on the levelling-up agenda. It’s a key long-term aspiration for the north-east and boasts cross-party support from MPs, councillors, businesses and partnerships.
“Recent cuts to bus services have had a devastating effect across the Sedgefield constituency and I’ve been working closely with Tees Valley Combined Authority, Darlington Borough Council and Durham County Council to find out the best way to ensure my constituents have access to employment and educational opportunities as well as access to health care, leisure and retail and just being able to stay in touch with family and friends.
“Coalfield communities worked hard for us, now let’s work hard for them by opening up and improving transport routes across bus and rail services.”
Durham County Councillor David Sutton-Lloyd, Conservative Councillor for Aycliffe North & Middridge and Chair of the Northern area of the Industrial Communities Alliance attended the Coalfields Community Event in Westminster on Monday 12th June 2023 and said: “As Chair of the Northern area of the Industrial Communities Alliance I welcome the progress made on the next steps of these important issues for the future of many former coalfields including Durham.
“This report builds on the excellent long standing research work of the National Industrial Alliance who have submitted well balanced plans on ‘levelling up’ crucially Shared Prosperity Funding, streamlining and long-term funding plans, together with other ideas on education, apprenticeships and gap funding. All need to be acted on.”