A MANIFESTO FOR THE TEES VALLEY MADE IN THE TEES VALLEY
Contents What is the Metro Mayor?
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Sue’s 5 Point Plan for the Tees Valley
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Building a Winning Team
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Creating Jobs
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A Transport System Which Works
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Making Work Secure
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A High Skills Tees Valley
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Regenerating our Communities
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A Fair and Equal Tees Valley
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SUE JEFFREY Labour’s Candidate for Metro Mayor
Foreword We built the world here in the Tees Valley. Ships built at Hartlepool steamed across every ocean. Steel from Middlesbrough and Redcar runs through structures from the Churchill War Rooms, to the Sydney Harbour Bridge, to the Sky Scrapers looming over New York. Railways spread from Stockton to Darlington and on the every corner of the globe. Decades of industrial decline have not been addressed by government in London. It is now time for the Tees Valley to take control of its own destiny to reforge our economy for ourselves - a future for the Tees Valley, made here in the Tees Valley. As Metro Mayor, I would ensure the Tees Valley controls its own future - fighting for more and refusing to settle for less. I have set out a five point plan to prioritise investment which will help create jobs and homes, and tackle low pay and poor job security. In this manifesto, I lay out my plan to restore our area’s pride and passion, to drive forward our economy, and to make sure our people have the skills they need for our new economy. I’ve lived in the Tees Valley for most of my life; it is where I raised my family and first started to fight for local people. I have worked in housing regeneration, rebuilding our homes and communities here in the Tees Valley I led the organisations which paved the way for our area to start bringing back power from London. As a council leader, I stood up to Tory cuts. When the Tory government let our steel industry die, I campaigned to save SSI, and now I lead efforts to support the workers & regenerate the site. It is a privilege to be running to be the first Metro Mayor of the Tees Valley. My manifesto contains solid, credible pledges to shape our areas future in a way that delivers for all the people of the Tees Valley.
Labour’s candidate for Metro Mayor –3–
What is the Metro Mayor? In 2015, I led the Tees Valley negotiations which agreed a devolution deal which meant decisions long made by bureaucrats in London will now be made here. The deal sees Darlington, Hartlepool, Redcar and Cleveland, Middlesbrough and Stockton-onTees come together as part of a Combined Authority to make decisions on transport, skills, planning, growth and investment. Heading this up will be the Metro Mayor. Our brilliant local councils will stay. They will still continue to deliver local services to their residents. They –4–
will each send a representative their leader or mayor - to the Combined Authority to work alongside the new Metro Mayor to deliver Tees Valley -wide projects to revitalise our economy, improve our transport infrastructure and up-skill our workforce. This is not about creating a new super council. This is about Tees Valley communities working together to take decisions locally rather than see them made by Government officially in London. We cannot wait around any longer for Westminster to come up with the answers. Now is the time to start doing things for ourselves.
Sue’s 5 Point Plan for the Tees Valley 1 - JOBS
We must reduce our dependency on foreign investment & ensure the Tees Valley controls the funds to support business & industry.
2 - EDUCATION & SKILLS
I will take funding from London & use it to develop our own skills strategy, one that’s right for our people.
3 - HIGH PAY ECONOMY
I will work to deliver a Tees Valley living wage of £8.45 an hour & make more secure jobs.
4 - REGENERATING HOMES & 5 - BUILDING A WINNING TEAM
My plan will bring 25,000 more jobs, build 20,000 new homes & improve communities & town centres.
We must stand together to speak up for the Tees Valley. I’ll give us a strong & united voice, fighting for more & refusing to settle for less.
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Building a Winning Team People across the Tees Valley know we share a success story to be proud of; now is the time to unite together and build on that.
that matter when talking about the North. As we step out of their shadow I will lead talks for further devolution and ensure we keep on working together to take power out of London, ensuring people here decide where best to invest.
I want to be the mayor who brings together our different strengths and gives us a voice Government cannot ignore.
As someone committed to building a Tees Valley voice I have worked with groups, businesses and individuals across the area listening to what they need from devolution, and promising to fight for the issues that unite us.
We will be the only people enjoying a devolution deal on the entire east coast of the country, giving us a tremendous head start and the chance to act as a beacon for job creation and investment. For too long we have seen ministers act as if Newcastle or Manchester are all –6–
My Priorities 6 – I will deliver a Tees Valley plan for Brexit, finding opportunities for new investment and trade, minimising risk to our business and industry and securing replacements for European funding.
1 – I will bring together the 660,000 people who make up the Tees Valley to give us a strong national and international voice. 2 – I will bring new opportunities to the Tees Valley. My devolution plan is about taking powers and funds out of Whitehall. Your council remains your local council.
7 – I will lead talks on the second round of devolution. This is just the beginning for the Tees Valley, we need to go further and faster, securing the powers we need to build a strong, vibrant and more equal society.
3 – I will create a new Mayor’s Award to champion the community groups that lead efforts locally to make the Tees Valley a great place to live.
8 – I will work with other northern leaders and Mayors to ensure the north is able to deliver to its full potential and not held back by the wrong policies and investment decisions.
4 – I will appoint business ambassadors to work with the Mayor to sell the Tees Valley to the world. 5 – My Mayor’s Office will hold a continuous conversation with residents and businesses, ensuring your views always shape my plans.
9 – In the Tees Valley we all know there is so much to be proud of. I will make the Mayor’s Office the driving force behind Tees Valley’s bid for City of Culture. I’ll work to boost tourism jobs by at least 3,000 by 2026.
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Creating Jobs Creating jobs will be the number one role of my Mayor's Office. It is through access to well paid jobs that the Tees valley will turn around expectations and life chances and ensure we are best placed for the future.
I helped put together a plan for the Tees Valley which sets out how we can invest in priority areas and create 25,000 new jobs by 2026. I want to make sure everyone can play their part in that, from helping turn university research into cutting edge jobs to ensuring small business have access to finance.
There are two ways we can do this. One is working with business to ensure they have the support they need to grow, and the other is directly intervening to build employment opportunities.
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My Priorities 1 – I will deliver a Tees Valley investment fund directing millions of pounds into priorities people here want to see backed, not officials in London
help our economy grow and benefit our citizens, including investigating the role out of more free public wifi, recognising that digital infrastructure is as important as road and rail.
2 – I will Make our £15m a year devolution fund work for us all. Using it to deliver new investment plans and attract private finance to transform the Tees Valley.
7 – I will fight to secure a strong future for our industry spearheading innovative projects including carbon capture storage and utilisation; the use of hydrogen for heating and power; a metals and materials Catapult, and private wire and district heating schemes to keep energy costs down for industry and communities alike.
3 – I will direct funding to deliver growth in our key sectors, working with public and private leaders across the Tees Valley to create 25,000 additional jobs by 2026. 4 – Government promised the Tees Valley the power to borrow, freeing up more job creation funds paid for from money recovered from London. I will ensure those powers are handed over. 5 – Teesside University is a world class asset vital to our future. I will work with them to ensure students have the chance to turn research excellence in to commercial opportunity
8 – I want small business growth to underpin our local economy, so I will ensure they have access to investment to grow and thrive. 9 – I will chair the South Tees Development Corporation so that this site of national and international significance attracts new world class sustainable industry and jobs. As Mayor I will maintain pressure on government to keep its promise to pay for the cost of regeneration. 10 – I will lead a land commission and ensure long derelict and unused public land is freed up to provide sites for investment and growth.
6 – I will investigate how the Mayor can support the Tees Valley with a world class digital infrastructure to –9–
A Transport System Which Works How we get around the Tees Valley, for work or leisure, has to change. We all know the roads which are a near certainty for congestion, or the buses that cost too much and don't go where we need them to.
to use new devolution powers to make changes. Too often difficult and expensive transport journeys act as a barrier to jobs. I promise to treat transport as a job creation issue just as much as a congestion issue.
As Mayor, I will ensure the big infrastructure works, the new bridges and roads, are completed, but I want to go further than that. Public transport needs to serve the public better. Our rail and buses need to be joined up, and if the bus companies won’t voluntarily match our needs, we should be prepared
Good transport is key to a strong Tees Valley. This is why I'll be ensuring the Mayor's Office puts the resources in place to back projects such as the wider transformation of Darlington Station, ready for high speed rail, and building a new bridge over the River Tees.
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My Priorities 1 – I will deliver on a realistic plan for Tees Valley’s airport to ensure it has a long-term, sustainable future, developing it as business hub, providing incentives for growth including investigating enterprise zone status and improving transport links.
5 – I will lead efforts to build a new congestion-busting bridge over the River Tees.
2 – Getting across the Tees Valley without a car is often a task in itself. I want to join up rail, buses and other transport into a Tees Valley metro.
7 – I will improve key junctions on the A66, radically improving east west journey times from Darlington to the port.
3 – Buses need to serve the Tees Valley better. I will investigate new powers in the Buses Bill to see if we should be having a bigger say over fares and routes, at the same time I will look to see what subsidies or targeted bus passes we need to get people around better, especially students, young workers or those without access to public transport. 4 – Bringing together our transport works is vital if we are to make better use of them. I will work with our councils to co-ordinate efforts from pot hole repairs to highways priorities.
6 – I will support Darlington to be ready for High Speed rail as part of wider investment plans in the borough.
8 – I will ensure we get the rail upgrades we need, acting as a rail watchdog to make sure line enhancements move freight quicker and making sure Northern Rail sees replacing pacer trains as a priority. 9 – I will make sure cycling and walking are built in to our regeneration plans, helping create a safe, direct and attractive cycling and walking network.
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Making Work Secure Everyone should have the chance of a decent job that pays more than just the basic needed to just about get by. As Mayor, I would fight to end the shamefully low wages that see too many people here held back. We cannot simply be a low paid economy, and businesses that come here should know that investing in our people is the key to successful growth.
Full time employees on the real Living Wage earn £45 a week more than those on the government’s minimum. That’s the minimum Tees Valley workers deserve. Alongside that, the need for job security means we should unite against zero hour contracts, and ensure people winning public sector contracts know that these are our values.
I want a voluntary living wage introduced, one that business knows is good for them and good for their staff. –12–
My Priorities 1 – I will work with business to promote our own Living Wage so that the minimum a Tees Valley worker gets is £8.45 an hour 2 - I will ensure that anyone working with the Mayor’s Office knows they will be asked if they are prepared to pay the living wage. I will stand up to pay inequality, working with others to make pay fairer. 3 - I will never use the zero hour contracts which undermine job security 4 - I will ensure that our people are ready to take up new jobs with the skills they need to grow in their careers. 5 - I will lead on a buy local plan working with our biggest local spenders and employers (eg councils, the university, the NHS and large companies) to buy local so supporting Tees Valley jobs.
7 - I will work to remove the low pay label from the Tees Valley and make the days of exploiting cheap foreign labour to plug skills and productivity gaps a thing of the past. 8 - I will investigate options for using the Teesside Pension Fund to support long-term investment in major job creation schemes. 9 - I will look for ways to support those currently in low paid jobs, through access to better services including affordable public transport, childcare and banking. 10 - I will promote initiatives to get people into good jobs by ensuring employment support services focus on helping people into work with better prospects and higher earnings.
6 - I will use the Mayor’s spending power to ensure local firms can compete for publicly-funded work.
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A High Skills Tees Valley Fundamental to the Tees Valley's devolution bid was a belief that the people here know best how to direct public funds. nowhere is that more true than in skills training. We know which workforce need extra training to prepare for upcoming changes, and we know how our economy is changing and the areas we need to prepare for.
workforce for the opportunities ahead. I want to ensure everyone has access to those chances. That means taking a wider view of skills training, backing schemes such as those teaching coding to young women, using our skills budgets to address equality issues as much as employment opportunities.
Taking local decisions on where to invest skills funding is vital to our future. As preparing our existing –14–
My Priorities develop more specialisation linked to our growth sectors and work to improve the financial position of the sector. I will co-ordinate the skills links between Job Centres and colleges.
1 - I will work with the local education authorities and the Regional Schools Commissioner to improve the performance of our schools. 2 - I will ensure school age children gain meaningful work experience, rolling out the Foundation for Jobs ‘entitlement’ across the Tees Valley.
7 - I will insist control of the apprenticeship levy is in the next devolution deal. 8 - I will support the take up of apprenticeships in small businesses, and ensure across the Tees Valley the number of higher level apprenticeship schemes are increased.
3 - I will make sure that our investment in training and skills both supports the needs of employers and enables people to get a job and progress at work. 4 - I will target skills funding to secure training in key sectors so that everyone has the chance to compete for existing jobs in our area and those still to come.
9 - I will work with the university to support apprentice graduate schemes.
5 - I will ensure the most hard to reach groups benefit most from the devolution of the adult education budget focusing investment on community based projects. 6 - I will work with our Further Education providers to avoid duplication and competition,
10 - I will work to raise aspirations for our young people. Having seen the success of projects such as This Girl Codes I will use skills funds to ensure we have schemes that support young women into high value, high skilled jobs.
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Regenerating our Communities When we look around the Tees Valley it is clear there is much to be proud of, but alongside that are areas that have been denied investment for too long. Devolution has to be our chance tho ends the days of seeing what needs fixing but not having the tools to get the job done.
Business alone will not turn around run down shopping centres, or change brownfield sites in to homes. What the Tees Valley needs is a mayor who is prepared to act on local needs, ending the days of going cap in hand to London in order to secure investment.
I intend to use the Mayor’s budget to rebuild town centres, support job creation and build homes. That means backing our local councils and their regeneration plans, but also stepping in where the market has failed and creating the conditions for growth.
Good homes and good jobs go hand in hand, and I intend to use the powers of the Mayor’s Office to ensure we in the Tees Valley come together to create both.
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My Priorities 1 - I will lead on a plan to create 20,000 new homes across the Tees Valley, working with Councils, Housing Associations and the private sector to bring forward new development building homes people can afford in places where they want to live. 2 - I will take over unused public sector land, ending wastage and providing sites for jobs and homes. 3 - I will protect parks and green spaces to ensure as far as possible everyone has access to wellmaintained green space within walking distance of their home. 4 - I will create incentives for business to grow, through powers to establish Mayoral Development Corporations and/or new enterprise zones. 5 - I will create good quality homes in our town centres, bringing them back in to use as living areas and helping preserve our green belt where possible.
6 - I will investigate new methods of getting young people on the property ladder, including look at the possibility of introducing mortgage support or new rent to buy schemes that work here in the Tees Valley. 7 - I will insist the Government stands by its devolution commitment to housing in the Tees Valley by handing over control of ÂŁ100m plus housing pot to invest in locally agreed housing priorities. 8 - I will build on recent excellent progress to rejuvenate our town centres working alongside our five councils to reinvigorate high streets and boost our local economies. My aim will be for all our towns to have thriving retail, employment and business opportunities alongside great leisure, entertainment and cultural facilities. 9 - I will back a voluntary registration scheme to promote the best private landlords.
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A Fair and Equal Tees Valley Uniting my manifesto pledges is my belief that the Mayor has to work for everyone, not just those at the top. Having a mayor, especially when other areas have not gone down the devolution route, gives us a chance to succeed in ways others can’t. While securing investment and creating jobs is an essential part of that success, it has to be about more than that. Prosperity has to reach all, and people who are held back need the same chance to succeed as those at the top.
for equality, and having a mayor means we have focal point to unite behind. So from supporting people with disabilities or setting out to make the Tees Valley dementia friendly, we have in the Mayor’s Office a new way of achieving those aims. One of the biggest lessons we can borrow from American mayors is that sometimes it is not the powers you have but the partnership you create that lets you make a real difference in creating equality, and I want to be the mayor who makes that happen.
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My Priorities 1 - I will lead work to challenge inequality. I will use the Mayor’s Office to promote equality, embrace diversity and enable inclusion. 2 - I will build a strong partnership with the voluntary and community sector recognising and supporting their unique and important role to unlock the full potential of our people. 3 - I will work for a fairer Tees Valley, one where everyone, wherever they are from and whatever their background, is supported to get on and no-one is left behind. To start this work I will establish a Fairness Commission to develop more detailed plans to tackle inequalities across our area. 4 - I will ensure that the voice of disabled people is clearly heard in the work of the Mayor. All disabled people should have the same choice, control and freedom as anyone else – be that at home, at work, or in the community. 5 - I know that the Tees Valley has many strong and inspirational
women. As the only woman standing to be mayor, I want to use this election to make sure women have the same access to better quality jobs and a chance to grow in successful careers. I will use the mayor’s office to help women play their full part in our future success. 6 - I will work with interested organisations and our councils to make the whole Tees Valley Dementia-Friendly. 7 - I will work with the Cleveland and Durham Police and Crime Commissioners to tackle hate crime. 8 - I want the Tees Valley to be a place that celebrates and welcomes diversity. I will use the Mayors office to encourage and support activities that empower and inspire people from all backgrounds including different age groups, genders, races, disabilities, religions, and sexualities. 9 - I will develop new ways to help people hold the Mayor to account and commit to holding Mayoral Question Times in each borough every year.
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