Oral Answers to Questions

Jim McMahon Excerpts

Monday 30th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Jake Berry]

We are already investing some £67 million in the Humber and the Greater Lincolnshire local enterprise partnership, and I note that £20 million of that is going into my hon. Friend’s constituency. He will be aware that we committed in the industrial strategy to work on a business case for a Grimsby and Cleethorpes town deal. I hope that, in demonstrating that success, we can put our northern power towns at the heart of the northern powerhouse.

[Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

There is no surprise that the lived experience of people in Shields is of growth not happening, because when the northern powerhouse was launched in 2014, Government capital spending per person was £543 higher in London than in the north-east. London has seen its investment increase to £1,352 per person but, instead of the Government’s closing the gap, the north-east saw a cut in capital spending that increased the gap by 17% to £634 per person. How can the Government credibly claim to be the champions of the northern powerhouse when the evidence says that the money has not followed?

[Jake Berry]

I am certainly not going to take any lectures on the northern powerhouse from the hon. Gentleman, because after his election he described it as the “northern poorhouse”. Unlike Opposition Members, the Government are behind the north, not least by investing £13 billion in northern transport—more than any Government in history, including the Labour Government.