Private Eye delivers the beginner's guide to Houchens Teesworks:

I did buy a copy of Private Eye when they did a 2 page special (not long ago) and if true what they listed was not acceptable, by the developers on the Teesworks site.

In my opinion the people (HM Treasury?) providing the funders need to act to ensure the money is more correctly spent.
 
I did buy a copy of Private Eye when they did a 2 page special (not long ago) and if true what they listed was not acceptable, by the developers on the Teesworks site.

In my opinion the people (HM Treasury?) providing the funders need to act to ensure the money is more correctly spent.
But they won't. The whole point of the exercise is to do the opposite. It is naive to think otherwise.
 
Transparency or the lack of it, in this major project, is the key and is definitely required and soon.

Listening to the pod cast is like being given, some of the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and then trying to put it all together.

If I was providing the cash (Government departments) I would want to see all the pieces of the jigsaw and surely would have the legal right to to do so. As they say hundreds of miilions of pounds are involved. I think its around £200m. No one on here knows the answer.

Ref - when P/E talk about the Teesside Freeports, they have some of the facts missing - typical in a freeport materials are brought in tariff free and thus without the non traiff barriers that are currently in place and causing serioius admin problems/delays/costs, materials processed into a higher value product and exported. In a very broad sense the whole of the EU is a Freeport.

The Teesside Free port Zone is more than this. For example it offers lower taxes such as Employer National Insurance Contributions. It also covers a big area that the South Tees development area around Redcar and South Bank, includes parts of Middlesbrough, Darlington and Hartlepool as well as the Wilton International site. Its a special economic development zone as well as having aspect of an old fashioned freeport (like Rotterdam). This free port only became into being at the end of 2021, new development will take time. Surely the principle of special economic benefits to stuggling areas is a good one. The EU does this through regional social funds and doesn't allow individual government subsidies, without special dispensation.

There is no mention in the podcast of clearance work and decontamination of up to 200 years of industrial waste, i.e who is doing this? who ever it is, its going to be very extremely expensive to do. It seemed to take a decade to decontaminate Middlesbrough Dock near the Riverside Stadium. We all know work is going on, as former landmarks are cleared and vanish. Again an important piece of the jigsaw missing that would be interesting to know. There is also no mention in the podcast who is taking the risks of the development of the site to set timescales. I assume the move to make the private developers 90% share holders was to transfer risk to them and also to incentivise them to do all the necessary work.
 
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The problem with Houchen, like all regional or local political appointments, is the absolute lack of accountability. There's only marginally more for MP's.

The executive positions within our four local authorities are all scrutinised and accountable, but the regional Mayor isn't.

Supporters of political appointments like this will say that they're accountable to the electorate, but that's nonsense really.

These roles are largely unchecked and is no surprise that there's such a lack of apparent transparency.
 
Teesside desperately needs some form of special economic zone status - many areas away from London are getting terribly short changed.

Legal and General released a report last night saying regional economic differences are still increasing.

Having a more balanced UK economy helps the UK tax payer, we have the most distorted economy in the Developed World.
 
Losing all these assets, possibly including where I work to what could end up being private landlords fills me with so much apprehension for the future of what on this council's watch is becoming an alarmingly failing town. I have never ever felt this way about Middlesbrough before - but I feel decisions are being made right now that frustrating and even alaming.
The decision making process, from the outside, looks crazy. I hope your work is not too heavily impacted.

The get decision quick/lack of accountability trade-off is really worrying. The quality of the majority of local representatives is concerning too and the TVCA and MDC makeup is taking away from what little effective scrutiny there is. Looking at the documents officers produce for the current scrutiny procedures, what stands out is that the quality is shocking. But this is all perpetuating. Ultimately it does have an impact on the town. Poor decision-making processes, little accountability, poor quality of scrutiny, and deprivation means that local members will be more like social workers for their communities. Council Officers won’t want to be there and those who do have little accountability over their actions.

The problem with Houchen, like all regional or local political appointments, is the absolute lack of accountability. There's only marginally more for MP's.

The executive positions within our four local authorities are all scrutinised and accountable, but the regional Mayor isn't.

Supporters of political appointments like this will say that they're accountable to the electorate, but that's nonsense really.

These roles are largely unchecked and is no surprise that there's such a lack of apparent transparency.
This is ultimately the problem. Each combined authority has ad hoc scrutiny structures and they all differ in quality. But they can be removed by the Mayor of the CA. Burnham did it with Manchester, he removed fire and police scrutiny boards that had been set up by the Police and Crime Commissioner. I worked on regional political structure a few years ago when the Local Enterprise Partnerships were created and the problem was that people don't want more politics and definitely don't like the idea of more politicians. The problem is that you need a structure in place to provide scrutiny and accountability other than the ballot box and the people on the scrutiny boards (usually Councillors outside of London) are very low quality. London has the assembly which provides the political institution to deliver scrutiny - but again, who wants more politicians? The North East voted against having a devolved assembly for that reason.
Teesside desperately needs some form of special economic zone status - many areas away from London are getting terribly short changed.

Legal and General released a report last night saying regional economic differences are still increasing.

Having a more balanced UK economy helps the UK tax payer, we have the most distorted economy in the Developed World.
Whilst this is largely true. Special Economic Zones tend to move businesses rather than create them. It is something the architects of these policies are aware of and are trying to improve on. I was speaking to one of the first ministers who introduced these in Liverpool and London Docklands recently and he volunteered the opinion that they still don't have that right. I know from his experience, that there are frictions between getting stuff done in a timeframe that makes a difference to real people and achieving that in the most transparent way that brings a community with it.

I asked him how he managed it in Liverpool and he just said "I thought it would be a good idea to ask the people who live there if it was something they might want. And then I listened to them". A novel idea for a politician!
 
I’m not sure how anyone can have faith in Houchen anymore.
We’ve had more devolved money than at any other time and yet our area is suffering - certainly more than any time in my 45+ years.
He stopped declaring his donations a long time ago - mainly because they matched quite perfectly all of the companies who were getting contracts from the tax-payer money he controls.
Regardless of your thoughts on buying the airport, some positive, some negative, to put mechanisms in place to remove scrutiny and oversight is wrong when it is £110m of tax payer money.
On scrutiny meetings, he stopped attending TVCA scrutiny panels a long time ago also.
The dodgy deals done to give away 90% of Teesworks stinks - after he promised to bring back steel making. His donors now own the place after c£370m+ tax payer money has been spent on remediation. They also own further rights to cherry pick parcels of land and subsequent benefits at will.

How do we think the MDC will go now all of the properties are signed over to another cartel board he’s hand picked?

He’s blew the money, delivered nothing in return. Jobs down. Skills and apprenticeships down. Regional economy in the sink. Few local business owners are quids in.
He’s the perfect Tory. He does what they’ve always done.

It’s all our fault really. He’s been elected in twice and we’re only just starting to ask questions. Too late.
 
The decision making process, from the outside, looks crazy. I hope your work is not too heavily impacted.

The get decision quick/lack of accountability trade-off is really worrying. The quality of the majority of local representatives is concerning too and the TVCA and MDC makeup is taking away from what little effective scrutiny there is. Looking at the documents officers produce for the current scrutiny procedures, what stands out is that the quality is shocking. But this is all perpetuating. Ultimately it does have an impact on the town. Poor decision-making processes, little accountability, poor quality of scrutiny, and deprivation means that local members will be more like social workers for their communities. Council Officers won’t want to be there and those who do have little accountability over their actions.


This is ultimately the problem. Each combined authority has ad hoc scrutiny structures and they all differ in quality. But they can be removed by the Mayor of the CA. Burnham did it with Manchester, he removed fire and police scrutiny boards that had been set up by the Police and Crime Commissioner. I worked on regional political structure a few years ago when the Local Enterprise Partnerships were created and the problem was that people don't want more politics and definitely don't like the idea of more politicians. The problem is that you need a structure in place to provide scrutiny and accountability other than the ballot box and the people on the scrutiny boards (usually Councillors outside of London) are very low quality. London has the assembly which provides the political institution to deliver scrutiny - but again, who wants more politicians? The North East voted against having a devolved assembly for that reason.

Whilst this is largely true. Special Economic Zones tend to move businesses rather than create them. It is something the architects of these policies are aware of and are trying to improve on. I was speaking to one of the first ministers who introduced these in Liverpool and London Docklands recently and he volunteered the opinion that they still don't have that right. I know from his experience, that there are frictions between getting stuff done in a timeframe that makes a difference to real people and achieving that in the most transparent way that brings a community with it.

I asked him how he managed it in Liverpool and he just said "I thought it would be a good idea to ask the people who live there if it was something they might want. And then I listened to them". A novel idea for a politician!

A good post - I wasn't suggesting the zones could create wealth on their own, but by relocating economic activity on a national scale a better balanced economy is created. so the Zone would be more for larger employers and busineses would not qualify if they have moved jobs from less than 20 miles away etc. The civil service jobs moving to Darlington from London is an example of the economic activity that should make some change. I was told ICI was given carrots and sticks ot move chemical production to new site at Wilton from places like Croydon in the 1940s and 50s and Wilton and Teesside benefitted for another 40 years on that decision. Without Government intervention it would not have happened.
 
A good post - I wasn't suggesting the zones could create wealth on their own, but by relocating economic activity on a national scale a better balanced economy is created. so the Zone would be more for larger employers and busineses would not qualify if they have moved jobs from less than 20 miles away etc. The civil service jobs moving to Darlington from London is an example of the economic activity that should make some change. I was told ICI was given carrots and sticks ot move chemical production to new site at Wilton from places like Croydon in the 1940s and 50s and Wilton and Teesside benefitted for another 40 years on that decision. Without Government intervention it would not have happened.
This can be done by government fiat. It doesn't need opaque political arrangements to bring it about.
 
A good post - I wasn't suggesting the zones could create wealth on their own, but by relocating economic activity on a national scale a better balanced economy is created. so the Zone would be more for larger employers and busineses would not qualify if they have moved jobs from less than 20 miles away etc. The civil service jobs moving to Darlington from London is an example of the economic activity that should make some change. I was told ICI was given carrots and sticks ot move chemical production to new site at Wilton from places like Croydon in the 1940s and 50s and Wilton and Teesside benefitted for another 40 years on that decision. Without Government intervention it would not have happened.
Yeah. History central Government had more power to determine where things could be located but generally there was more of an industrial strategy and public-private cooperation meant a different thing to what it does now.

On the moving of Govt departments, this is a difficult one. I do agree that decentralisation of Whitehall is a good thing but from 2000 onwards it has been used to replace the loss of key industries. That has a negative impact on the labour market. There is a limit to the level of brain retention that is lost in decentralisation from London which is a concern. Obviously they should decentralise what they can where possible but it’s not a healthy sign of local economic activity and certainly not as favourable as jobs created by a healthy private sector.

As you have said, it comes down to competition with other local authorities and this will or could help diversify our struggling industries and kickstart new ones. The merry accountability is an avoidable mistake and hopefully one that is dealt with in The latest round of devolution deals. The rumour is a the requirement for elected mayors of Combined Authorities will have to go to quarterly MP committee hearings to justify their actions. At least that will provide some scrutiny where local elected members have failed.
 
This can be done by government fiat. It doesn't need opaque political arrangements to bring it about.
I agree. In my opinion Governments of the Right, Left and Centre have really failed to do this in the last 44 years, leaving the UK with such an unequal and unbalanced economy experts say its the most unequal in the Developed World. In this country it has led to angry voters. Doing nothing is not the answer neither. Some of the new economic zone is a start. If Labour do get in 2024 it will be interesting to see what they do with regards economic development in areas such as Teesside.
 
I agree. In my opinion Governments of the Right, Left and Centre have really failed to do this in the last 44 years, leaving the UK with such an unequal and unbalanced economy experts say its the most unequal in the Developed World. In this country it has led to angry voters. Doing nothing is not the answer neither. Some of the new economic zone is a start. If Labour do get in 2024 it will be interesting to see what they do with regards economic development in areas such as Teesside.
The unbalanced economy surely seems from the fact that London is just so much bigger than any other city and so just keeps sacking in talent and resources.

Other countries tend to have large population centres distributed so more than 1 that is close to 7x bigger than anywhere else.

I have no idea how you solve this without actually hobbling London to force people to move eg migrate elsewhere in UK
 
The unbalanced economy surely seems from the fact that London is just so much bigger than any other city and so just keeps sacking in talent and resources.

Other countries tend to have large population centres distributed so more than 1 that is close to 7x bigger than anywhere else.

I have no idea how you solve this without actually hobbling London to force people to move eg migrate elsewhere in UK
I saw recently MP Simon Clarke advertising Levelling Up Money will be devoted to solving the Marton Crawl. Levelling up money is going into renovation work opening up the arches of Yarm Town Hall and soon for a new conference centre in Preston Park. You may well ask just is this levelling up or merely creating more us and them disparities in our area. Similar schemes for Billingham town centre for instance are not being backed, nothing to do with the party of the local sitting MP.
 
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