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Here's the Mancunian Way for today:
Hello,
Sir Keir Starmer was in Manchester today, outlining his five ‘missions’ that would guide a Labour government. The Labour leader promised to end ‘sticking plaster politics’ and ‘ruffle feathers across Whitehall and beyond’ with his plans to boost economic growth, fix the NHS and tackle crime.
He also promised to support measures to prevent another tragedy like the death of Awaab Ishak in Rochdale.
"Everybody, when we saw that case, was absolutely shocked. Of course we have to support whatever measures necessary to make sure that that doesn't happen again,” he told reporter Joseph Timan.
"I hark back to my previous life as a lawyer. I saw I don't know how many cases where I was representing people in rented accommodation who were putting up with damp and because we took action, the damp was abated for a bit, but nobody fixed the fundamentals and so we were back with other cases over and over again. That's why it has to be part of a mission-driven government to change this."
Speaking to an audience in central Manchester, Starmer said his pledge on growth would drive up living standards across the country.
“I’m not interested in a model of growth where London races ahead and the rest of our country stagnates,” he said. “Nor will I be satisfied if our growth depends on creating jobs that are low paid and insecure. We need growth from the grassroots - a new model. Wealth created everywhere, by everyone, for everyone,” he said.
Child refugees put to work on 'Counterfeit Street'
The proliferation of counterfeit goods and fake prescription medication sold around the Strangeways area of Manchester has been widely reported on. So too have details of so-called county lines operations - in which children are coerced or controlled to undertake criminal activity, often drug dealing. But the link between the two has not been clear until now.
An article in Sunday’s Observer revealed that police have been searching for asylum seekers abducted from hotels run by the Home Office on Manchester’s ‘Counterfeit Alley’. Now Manchester Evening News chief reporter Neal Keeling has offered up some more context on the worrying development.
Greater Manchester Police has confirmed that child refugees have been put to work in the area by criminals. Some of the organised crime gangs operating in the area have recruited these vulnerable youngsters to run drugs.
Detective Superintendent Neil Blackwood says the force has several ongoing investigations into unaccompanied children who have arrived in the UK, are housed in ‘a social care setting’ and then fall prey to criminal gangs who use ‘a county lines model to exploit them’. It is believed they are put to 'work' by older criminals managing supplies of Class C drugs such as cannabis, illicit prescription drugs and amphetamines.
"In this case, we are seeing young people and children exploited by older criminals who have the same background - i.e. many are from the same country of origin - and so they have commonality; or there is some threat against the families back in their home country,” DS Blackwood says.
It is thought some may be in debt to those who control them, having travelled ‘considerable distances’ to the UK. "The past 12 months has seen a significant increase in the use of kidnap as a tool to demand payment for illegal immigration," the detective says.
Police intelligence indicates the network of hotels used by the Home Office to house asylum seekers has been targeted by organised criminals. "Large numbers go missing en masse - 20 to 30 Afghans in one go, [unaccompanied] kids too," DS Blackwood adds.
"Where are they going? They are brought to Cheetham Hill, scooped up by criminal enterprises and put to work. Children are taken into county lines, put to work by their own nationality selling drugs. They have come to our attention within weeks of arriving in the UK."
The Home Office says local authorities are responsible for all looked-after children in their area and have a statutory duty to protect and safeguard children.
The operation to crack down on criminality around Strangeways and Cheetham Hill is ongoing at pace. As Detective Chief Inspector Jen Kelly puts it: “They know we’re not going away, they know we’re here relentlessly pursuing them.”
Reporter Stephen Topping went out on a raid around the warren of shops, warehouses and industrial units with Greater Manchester Police officers yesterday morning. Officers say the 200 counterfeit shops around Great Ducie Street and Bury New Road has been reduced to 'the low tens' with an estimated £40m of fake goods seized since Operation Vulcan launched last year.
"Had you been here three or four months ago there would have been hundreds of people already this morning looking for those shops. They’re not here anymore,” Detective Superintendent Neil Blackwood told Stephen.
"This would have been a thriving counterfeit goods network. We've already seen accounts this morning that say these shops were earning in the region of £60,000 over a couple of months. That's actually quite low for around here."
DCI Kelly says previous efforts to clean up the area have proven difficult, but ‘Vulcan’ has been a success so far. "In the past, police would raid a shop, clear it out and then they would refill it or move to another shop in the area. We’re not seeing that anymore, we’re closing shops with our partners for the long term,” she says.
The patients stuck in ambulances
A total of 6,688 patients were waiting in ambulances parked outside hospitals across Greater Manchester over ten-months last year.
Of those, 1,313 were waiting outside hospitals in Manchester, with the majority stuck outside North Manchester General.
Almost 17,000 patients were still waiting with paramedics more than 60 minutes after arriving at hospitals across the city-region during the period up to last month. Around a third of these patients were waiting to be handed over to hospital staff in Manchester - although some waited within the A&E department itself.
During a Manchester council scrutiny meeting yesterday, North West Ambulance Service representatives said there have been 'significant improvements' in handover times in the last six weeks.
Greater Manchester head of operations Dan Smith told councillors NWAS paramedics are ‘not trained to manage a patients' care for more than an hour really’. As such, the service has brought in processes to ensure paramedics have the tools needed to manage patients ‘in that timeframe’.
You belong with me
The saga of ‘Tram Taylor’ continues. The cardboard cutout of Taylor Swift, which stared out at Metrolink commuters from a flat in Castlefield, looked set to disappear when her owner announced they were moving to Yorkshire.
But Red Redmond has come up with a solution by renting out the apartment with the non-negotiable condition that Taylor stays in place. The property is now up for rent on the Reeds Rains website listed as the ‘iconic Tram Taylor apartment’ and it could be yours for £1,050 per month.
In the listing Reeds Rains makes it clear that Taylor is to stay put, adding: “Be the first to call Tram Taylor your new housemate (she must stay in place) and join in on the online Manchester sensation that has been providing tram commuters happiness each morning!”
You can read more here. And you’ll be pleased to see that writer Bethan Shufflebotham has kept up the local journalism tradition of ramming as many Swift song titles into her copy as possible. Enjoy!
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Weather etc
- Temperatures: Overcast changing to sunny intervals by lunchtime. 11C.
- Road closures: A627 Dowson Road Northbound closed due to water main work from Thornley Street to B6468 Market Street until March 3.
- Trivia question: The 234-foot tower of which Greater Manchester prison has become a local landmark?
Manchester headlines
Found: A missing cat has been reunited with his stunned owners - after more than six years. The RSPCA found 'Raffi' injured in a garden five miles away from where he was last seen. He disappeared from his home in Old Trafford shortly before Christmas in 2016. Owner Mustafa Javed and his family concluded he had most likely died and they even held a 'burial' ceremony for him. But on January 17, the RSPCA got in touch to say he had been found. "We wish Raffi could talk and tell us his story,” Mr Javed said.
New hub: Cabinet Office Minister Jeremy Quin visited Manchester to break ground on the near £40 million government hub taking place in the city's burgeoning First Street district today. Some 2,500 civil servants will be based in the new northern hub - next to the HOME, from 2025. About 1,800 already based offices at Piccadilly Gate will relocate to First Street to make way for HS2, but there will be 700 new jobs which will move from the South East to Manchester. Mr Quin told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that the move was a ‘really important milestone’.
New block: Plans for a new 13-storey office block in Manchester city centre have been revealed. The offices - which have been designed to run without emitting any additional carbon - would be located between River Street and Hulme Street. Developer Ask Real Estate has now submitted a planning application for the offices to Manchester council as part of the next phase of development at First Street.
Evacuated: Residents of Bracken House - which was evacuated on December 22 due to fire safety concerns - are still without proper homes two months later. Tenants have been staying in hotels or serviced apartments, paid for by building managers IPM, which has also forked out for meals. But one resident said they are ‘severely stressed’ about the situation. More here.
Worth a read
June Kelly has run Abraham Moss Warriors for nearly decades. In that time she has seen thousands of Manchester's most disadvantaged young people pass through, helping them learn crucial life skills by focusing on a common love of the beautiful game.
"Football is just a tool really - what we're trying to teach kids is all those soft skills like self esteem, confidence, friendship. That's what we're trying to teach the kids, and keep them warm and feed them," she says.
The club is just metres from a tram stop where fights and stabbings have broken out on numerous occasions - but the club is about helping the area's children stay off the streets.
But with costs rising, June is turning to fundraising to survive. Nicole Wootton-Cane has been speaking to June about the club’s past and it’s future.
That's all for today
Thanks for joining me. If you have stories you would like us to look into, email beth.abbit@menmedia.co.uk.
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The answer to today's trivia question is: HMP Manchester, or Strangeways as it's known locally.
