Teesside MPs from opposite ends of spectrum united against government cuts
PLUS: Radioactive waste on Teesside, TVCA management criticise culture
Another Sunday morning, another Teesside Lead… This is number 57.
I’ve been asking MPs in Teesside this week about the government’s plans to cut PIP, and then the government made a U-turn, but the concessions from Sir Keir Starmer don’t go far enough according to those I spoke to.
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Enjoy your week,
Leigh
Two Teesside MPs from opposite ends of the Labour Party have told The Teesside Lead they still won’t vote for the government’s cuts to disability welfare, despite Sir Keir Starmer already making huge concessions on the legislation to appease more than 120 of his own backbenchers.
Last week more than 120 Labour MPs put their names to an amendment which would kill the government’s Universal Credit and Personal Independence Payment Bill, which many had described as being cruel.
The bill’s intention is to save £5bn a year by limiting the number of people who can claim for Personal Independence Payments (PIP) or the health aspect of Universal Credit.
Sir Keir Starmer climbed down on Thursday evening, saying that the changes to state support would now only affect future claimants instead of those already in receipt of the benefit.
Despite this, Hartlepool MP Jonathan Brash - who is a member of the Blue Labour group of MPs on the right wing of the party - and Middlesbrough and Thornaby East MP Andy McDonald - who was a member of Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet - have both told The Teesside Lead that they won’t support the bill, despite Sir Keir Starmer’s concessions.
In an interview which was held on Wednesday, Mr Brash told me he couldn’t support the bill because its objectives were wrong.
“If you’re trying to answer the question ‘Can we bring the welfare bill down by successfully getting people off benefits and into meaningful employment?’, then you come up with one answer,” he said.
“If the question you’re asking is ‘How can we just cut the bill?’, then you come up with this answer. That’s the difference for me, if your strategic objective is to get welfare down by making work pay and getting people into those jobs that will pay, then that’s great, but this doesn’t do that.
“This just fundamentally fails that.”
In Hartlepool there are 10,900 people in receipt of PIP, a small weekly payment to help with extra living costs if people have a long-term physical or mental health condition or disability which affects a person’s ability to do everyday tasks.
When asked if he thought the bill had been rushed, he said the bill was published before the consultation ended, saying: “that doesn’t really suggest that the consultation was meaningful.”
He expressed his frustration at how the bill had been presented. “They want to look again at the criteria and assessment of things like PIP - that’s brilliant. Why are we making the cuts before we’ve done any of that? Before we’ve actually thought about how to end a culture that’s become welfare dependent.
“Making cuts first and then reform second is the wrong way around,” he says.
Brash’s counterpart in the Middlesbrough and Thornaby East seat is Andy McDonald, a former member of Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet, and very much on the left-wing of the Labour Party.
After the government made its concessions on the bill, McDonald told me he’d be voting against it “because it hasn’t dealt with the whole picture.”
In his constituency, there are just over 12,000 PIP claimants.
He adds: “As it currently stands, people who are in receipt of PIP or the UC health are struggling to hold it together as things are, so to think that future recipients and those who contract conditions are not going to be treated in the way that they would be today worries me enormously.
“This may look like a compromise,” he said of the government U-turn, “but it’s certainly not a compromise for those future claimants.
“The deficit that’s going to be visited upon them is going to be enormous. So for those reasons, I’ll be voting against.”
Speaking to BBC Radio Tees on Friday morning, he warned of creating a “two-tier system”.
When I suggest to Brash that it’s more than just the River Tees that separates them, he laughs, “We’re very good friends!”
Does the unity across the political spectrum suggest the government’s got it wrong?
“I think the thing that unites all members of parliament is we spend our days talking to the people who’ll be directly affected by these policies. We talk to people who are genuinely frightened, genuinely scared about what this is going to bring. And as a result realise why we can’t possibly support it.
“It can’t be described as the usual suspects, it’s not the same old rebels, it’s not the left wing or the right wing, it’s everybody across the party because we all have one thing in common, which is that we are talking to our constituents.”
The vote is set to take place on Tuesday. If all opposition parties voted the way of the 120 rebels it would have meant an embarrassing defeat for Sir Keir Starmer almost a year to the day since winning a huge majority in Parliament. Since the U-turn, it’s now much less clear how close the vote will be.
Just over 24 hours after I spoke to Brash it was reported the government had watered down its bill. I ask him if it’s given him enough to vote for the proposals.
“I’m not there yet”, he responds.
It’s time for the gratuitous plug. On Friday, myself and the authors Alex Niven and Peter Mitchell are putting on another night of culture and pints at the Alphabetti Theatre in Newcastle.
July 4th’s Lort Burn Special will see me in conversation with railway engineer Gareth Dennis. He wrote the excellent book, How The Railways Will Fix the Future (2024) and last year lost his job when the now-railways minister Lord Hendy intervened after he raised safety concerns about overcrowding at Euston station.
There’ll also be readings from local authors Yara Rodrigues Fowler, Lyndsey Ayre and Jake Trelease, as well as music from Lucy Valentine.
Get your tickets here - don’t wait we’ve sold more than we expected to by this point already!
Teesside stories you may have missed…
🔥 Coatham Marsh nature reserve was victim of what’s thought to be a deliberate fire
🐳 A suspected whale was spotted breaching in Teesmouth
🏗️ An £833m contract for building the NZT power station at Teesworks was awarded
🏰 Massive medieval walls have been discovered by archaeologists in Bishop Auckland
Teesside MP encourages locals to take part in radioactive waste consultation
Stockton North MP Chris McDonald has told The Teesside Lead it’s “vital” that local people are listened to as a landfill operator applies to the Environment Agency for permission to dispose of radioactive waste on Teesside.
Augean North Ltd, which runs the landfill in Port Clarence, has submitted an Environmental Safety Case (ESC) to the Environment Agency, the latest chapter in a long-running attempt by the company to get permission for the radioactive waste to be disposed of there.
In 2019 around 2,300 people took part in a four-month long consultation, with only 13 respondents in support of the plans.
Labour MP Mr McDonald encourages locals to take part in the latest consultation to have their voices heard.
“I've been contacted by a number of concerned residents about the renewed proposal to dispose of low-level radioactive waste at the Port Clarence landfill site.
“People across Stockton, Billingham and Norton have made it clear in the past that our area should not be used to dump waste that others do not want,” he told The Teesside Lead.
“While the Environment Agency is reviewing a revised safety case, it's vital that local communities are fully heard during this consultation - especially given the strength of feeling shown back in 2019.
I’ll be monitoring this closely and I encourage anyone with concerns to take part in the public consultation before 4 August. Our communities deserve transparency, proper scrutiny, and decisions that put our health and our environment first,” he said.
Auguean’s ESC says the waste poses “a relatively low risk to people and the environment”.
This Thursday (3rd July) it’s the monthly phone-in on BBC Radio Tees, the Houchen Hot Seat.
It’s the second of the newly-regular feature.
The last edition ended with somebody calling to say thank you to him and then we got to hear a song of his choice. He’ll be taking calls from 9am if you’re interested in taking part.
Meanwhile, you can ask Lord Houchen questions in person at the first Mayor’s Question Time event on 23 July at Yarm School. The event will be chaired by The Northern Echo’s historical features writer, Chris Lloyd.
Tickets are free, and you can get them here.
TVCA management criticise “unrealistic” comms strategy
Friday saw a double-header of local government activity for Tees Valley Combined Authority (TVCA).
The organisation’s AGM, coming hot off the heels of a Best Value Notice from the Government, and serious issues identified by the external auditors, had nine items on the agenda spanning an insanely huge 485 pages, but only half an hour scheduled for the annual event.
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