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By DAN O'DONOGHUE - June 17 2022
Doncaster's not just the best small city to invest in Europe but the best place in the country to see a polar bear and hear the phrase 'how much', joked local Tory MP Nick Fletcher this morning.
Speaking at Doncaster Racecourse, the Don Valley 'red wall' MP was welcoming politicians, activists and business leaders to the conference organised by the Northern Research Group made up of the region's Conservative backbenchers.
But will Boris Johnson be speaking this afternoon at the event, set up to develop policies to move on the PM's Levelling Up agenda and help Northern Tories cement their 2019 General Election gains?
His appearance in a major speaking slot this afternoon was widely reported in advance but overnight Downing Street briefed journalists he wouldn't be attending.
Organisers were privately confident he'd turn up but a no-show would be a damaging blow to his relationship with an increasingly influential strand of his party.
You can watch the event live here , including Northern Agenda Editor Rob Parsons chairing a debate on devolution. The gathering of Tory MPs - including Bishop Auckland 's Dehenna Davison, who revealed this month she had no confidence in Boris Johnson - and activists with business and political leaders comes amid fears Mr Johnson's 'levelling up' promises have yet to materialise in the face of the pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis.
In his own speech this afternoon, NRG chairman and Lancashire MP Jake Berry will pile the pressure on Johnson by unveiling three proposals he believes will ensure the survival of Conservatism in the North, as well as this government’s majority at the next election.
One is a so-called 'Levelling Up Formula', an equivalent to the Barnett formula which adjusts public spending in Scotland and Wales to reflect changes in England. Mr Berry says the change would equalise spending between London and poorer areas and "see more money spent in the North but also, in Cornwall, in the Southwest and in the Midlands".
The former Northern Powerhouse Minister calls for more radical devolution of powers so local leaders can lower taxes, dictate housing requirements and set stamp duty rates, something previously opposed by Rishi Sunak's Treasury.
He will say: "Let’s build an economy that’s more Canary North and less Canary Wharf. There are almost as many people living in Greater Manchester as in Wales - yet Wales has power over tax, while Greater Manchester does not."
And he calls on the Government to reverse the Labour policy of getting 50% of young people into university by instead setting the same target for high-level apprenticeships. Earlier this year think-tank Onward said a shortage of apprenticeships for young people was holding back the North.
The Tories' favourite metro mayor, Tees Valley 's Ben Houchen, said in a video message recorded from a business trip in Albania that "we need to devolve more powers and more money back to the North of England, so we can get on and control our own destinies".
His short message twice featured the phrase 'get back on track', a sign that even amongst Tories who back the PM there's impatience over a lack of tangible progress on tackling regional inequalities.
Mr Houchen said: "It's so vital that we refocus the government on its policy of levelling up in particular, in the North of England and make sure that we bridge that financial gap, that we raise the living standards of local people, that we attract more investment to the North and that we show the rest of the country, that if we level up the North of England, actually what that means is that UK PLC is better off altogether.
"Here's to re-energising the Northern agenda, getting back on track, seeing that investment coming into the North creating those jobs, and hopefully creating a better life for our constituents across the north and the whole of the UK."
Strikingly, the plea to government from Labour metro mayors speaking at a major education and skills event in Manchester was the same as among Tories in Doncaster in today.
West Yorkshire 's Tracy Brabin, Greater Manchester's Andy Burnham and Liverpool City Region's Steve Rotheram, told Northern Agenda Editor Rob Parsons that the hoarding of powers by central government was holding the region back.
One interesting aspect of the debate at the Northern Powerhouse Education, Employment and Skills Summit was questions posed by young people from the North West.
One of them, Rorey Scriven from Wigan , a teenager who grew up in care, told the mayors how young people with similar backgrounds to himself had some of the worst educational outcomes in the country. What could they do about that?
Mr Burnham pointed to the Greater Manchester care leavers' guarantee which includes giving care leavers free bus passes to the age of 21 rather than just 18 like the rest of the population.
And he challenged his fellow 'M62 mayors' to consider a care leavers guarantee that stretched across their patches covering some 7 million people in the North.
Crumbling schools are putting children 'at risk'
More than half of schools in parts of the North have buildings in urgent need of repair or replacement, new figures have shown.
Across the area, there were 2,314 state-funded schools that had at least one building with materials that were past their lifespan or at “serious risk of imminent failure”, according to a survey.
That was 35% of the 6,610 schools across the North of England, which means more than a third had one or more buildings with components in a bad state of disrepair.
But in Wakefield , 53% of its 143 schools had at least one building given the worst rating – the fourth-highest percentage of 152 areas across the country. That was followed by Newcastle at 51% and Redcar and Cleveland at 50%.
The Liberal Democrat’s education spokesperson Munira Wilson, who obtained the figures through a parliamentary question, said that parents deserve to know the schools they send their children to are safe but that “crumbling buildings” are putting them at risk.
A DfE spokesperson said: “The safety of pupils and staff is paramount. Buildings where there is a risk to health and safety will always be prioritised and we have allocated over £13 billion since 2015 to improve the condition of school buildings and facilities, including £1.8 billion this financial year."
GPs receiving Home Office deportation threat letters
New doctors are “literally going from celebrating the fact that they’ve become a GP to receiving letters threatening them with deportation”.
That's according to Dr Margaret Ikpoh, a GP Partner at Holderness Health in East Yorkshire who gave evidence to a Commons health and social care committee on the future of general practice.
As Local Democracy Reporter Joe Cooper writes Dr Ikpoh, who is also a vice-chair of the Royal College of GPs, said it was a particular problem in more deprived areas of the North, such as Hull, as up to 70% of new GPs tend to be from outside the UK in such areas.
Home Office rules state foreign doctors must work for at least five years before they can apply for indefinite leave to remain, but GPs usually finish their training after three years, leaving a two-year gap during which they have to secure sponsorship if they want to stay in the country when their visas run out.
Dr Ikpoh said: “That can’t be right. It has to change and we have to value them better – because if we don’t we’ll lose them, and some are already going to places where they feel that they are more valued, and Canada is on the top of the list. I think it’s an easy win for all of us to try and sort out.”
Professor Mike Holmes, a GP Partner at Haxby Group, a leading provider of GP services in York, Hull and Scarborough, told MPs pressure was increasing on services across his patch. We’ve seen workload go up,” he told MPs.
“The number of consultations now is much greater than they were even just two years ago pre-pandemic. We’re seeing reduced resources, financial resources, and that’s magnified in some of our more deprived areas."
Wakefield candidate asks voters to trust Tories as they trusted GPs after Harold Shipman
The Tory candidate in the Wakefield by-election has raised eyebrows after arguing voters should still back his party following the resignation of disgraced MP Imran Khan as “we still trust GPs” despite Harold Shipman having been a doctor.
Khan was jailed in May following his conviction for sexually assaulting a 15-year-old boy.
Nadeem Ahmed, who is hoping to retain the Wakefield seat for the Conservatives next week, said Khan was "one bad apple".
He added: "He’s in prison, which is the right place. As a teacher, a father, and as a human being, what he did was wrong. The people of Wakefield know that he was one bad apple.
"Harold Shipman committed suicide in Wakefield prison. He was a GP, he was a trusted professional, just like teachers and others. Have we stopped trusting GPs? No, we still trust GPs and we know that he was one bad apple in there.”
The comments come after the Northern Agenda and YorkshireLive hosted an online hustings for the Wakefield by-election earlier this week. Over the course of an hour candidates, including Mr Ahmed, debated everything from transport in the North to ethics in politics. The hustings is now available as a podcast.
While we're mentioning podcasts, the Northern Agenda has clocked some taxpayer funded competition.
Last month the House of Commons launched a new 12-part podcast series called the 'Committee Corridor'. Featuring MPs and parliamentary experts, the series examines how select committees "can influence the arguments and outcomes of some of the biggest debates".
A Northern Agenda Freedom of Information request has revealed Commons authorities have so far spent £200 promoting the show, but the full cost to the taxpayer is not known as officials refused to reveal the amount spent on an outside production firm as it was "commercially sensitive".
We're told the going rate for a podcast record is around £120 per session...
Liverpool to introduce new 'underground super-bins' in bid to clean up city
Liverpool City Council is set to launch an 'underground revolution' that will see 'subterranean super-bins' introduced around the city.
Just days after it launched a new partnership with Keep Britain Tidy, the council is looking to end a rubbish issue for huge swathes of the city, by installing large new underground bins.
The innovative scheme to retrofit waste collection in built-up urban areas is set to be the first of its kind in the UK.
The recommendation to begin consultations on introducing underground bins in several wards of the city will go to the council’s Cabinet next Friday, June 24. If it gets the green light the scheme will see these huge bins placed in 140 locations in densely built-up areas, many of which will replace some of the existing temporary communal bins.
It is expected phase one the £1.5m super-bin programme could begin to benefit people by the end of Summer. The scheme has been designed to create a cleaner waste solution for 27,000 terraced households, in hundreds of Liverpool's inner-city streets, which do not have the space to use a wheelie bin.
The city council is hoping this new approach will radically reduce the issue of ripped black bin bags spilling out on to streets and blighting neighbourhoods.
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Northern Stories
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A call has been made for Manchester 's senior coroner to be suspended amid concerns about his conduct and capacity to do the job. The Manchester Evening News revealed that a formal complaint on behalf of Manchester City Council has been made to the Judicial Conduct Investigations Office (JCIO) asking for an investigation into Nigel Meadows' conduct.
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Barrow borough council’s planning committee has voted against the erection of a statue of a Cumbrian businessman at an historic abbey. The move from councillors came despite the application for a tribute to Sir John Laing at Furness Abbey being recommended for approval. Cllr Hazel Edwards expressed concerns the application could set a precedent and lead to a ‘Terracotta Army of statues’ being introduced at the site. Cllr Edwards said: “It’s a relatively unknown person with only tentative connections to Barrow.”
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Black people in Merseyside are twice as likely to be arrested than white people. A scrutiny meeting of Merseyside Police senior officers heard that on average, black people across the region were 2.3 times more likely to be detained by officers than white people. The findings come hot on the heels of controversial comments by Merseyside Police and Crime Commissioner Emily Spurell in which she agreed Merseyside Police was institutionally racist.
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The restoration of the Tyne Bridge has taken another major step forward after a contractor was appointed to return the North East icon to its former glory. Two weeks after a long-awaited £41m refurbishment of both the bridge and the Central Motorway was finally approved by the government, Durham-based firm Esh Construction has been handed a contract to carry out the vital works. The Tyne Bridge has been in an increasingly rusted and dilapidated state for years, having now gone two decades without major maintenance, and local leaders are desperate to have its revamp completed in time for the crossing’s centenary in 2028.
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