Regeneration, skills, and business support are key issues currently being tackled by our area’s two Conservative Members of Parliament.
A virtual Q&A saw Great Grimsby MP Lia Nici and Cleethorpes MP Martin Vickers update constituents on news and developments from Parliament. Both are working from home due to Covid-19 restrictions.
Opening the session, Ms Nici explained how she is currently focussing on regeneration, supporting businesses through Brexit and increasing the skills of employees, and pushing hard on fisheries and food production. “Talking to businesses in Grimsby,” she said, “they definitely want to employ more local people than they currently do but we have an issue with people with a high enough level of skills that a lot of jobs need so we have a lot of work to do there.
“I’m also working with schools on getting more young people engaged and getting attainment levels up. Grimsby does not perform well nationally from a GCSE attainment point of view. The Prime Minister has asked me to write a report on education so I’m doing lots of research with schools, parents and children about what they think of education.
“I’m also working closely with the council on the regeneration of the town centre, but that can’t just be buildings. It needs to be about people, investment and new businesses coming into the area as well.”
There’s lots on the agenda, Ms Nici concluded, adding that her new year’s resolution is to increase her social media presence.
“I’ve had my head down in the last year,” she said, “to ensure that Grimsby is under the Cabinet’s political belt to make sure we’re getting funding and support, which we are. There’s lots of positive things to come. We are starting to get things done.”
Mr Vickers said: “Cleethorpes issues are very much tied into Grimsby but of course I have a wider remit, taking in the rural hinterland and Immingham to Barton. It’s particularly welcome these last eighteen months to have two Conservative-controlled councils to work with, in both North and North East Lincolnshire. Certainly we’ve seen considerable improvement in North East Lincolnshire since Councillor Philip Jackson and his team took over at the town hall.
“Regeneration is a key part, and part of that is the Greater Grimsby Town Deal which does of course incorporate Cleethorpes. Much of the environmental work going on in Cleethorpes is funded by the Government’s Coastal Communities Fund, which is through the Town Deal.
“Big news locally is our bid for Free Port Status for the Humber ports, our focus being on Grimsby and Immingham. ABP is leading the bid with support from local authorities and the Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP). I think we will have a good bid. Whether it’s successful in the first stage, who knows. There are only going to be ten to a dozen Free Port pilots. I’d like to think we could be one and we are pressing the case at every opportunity with ministers.
“Everything of course has been somewhat overshadowed by Covid and the responses to that. It’s made life very difficult: we can go down to London but since Christmas the advice, almost instruction, really is not to go and participate virtually, which is okay up to a point, but it does restrict opportunities to intervene in debates, at random leaping up and trying to catch the Speaker’s eye. It’s not as effective as normal business but in the circumstances, we make the best of it.”
In response to a question about supporting tourism in Cleethorpes during the pandemic, Mr Vickers said: “The focus at the moment is on trying to keep businesses afloat. The present lockdown and restrictions are, being realistic, going to continue I think to the end of March, before we begin to see the real benefits of the vaccination scheme. A lot has been done of course in keeping businesses afloat, by way of business rate relief and the furlough scheme, and bounce-back loans. The good news is that the Supreme Court has now ruled in favour of those businesses who tried to apply for insurance cover for loss of business and felt certain that these circumstances were covered by the wording in their policies. The British Insurance Association has made clear that they expect their members now to pay out on those policies.
“There are still gaps in the support system, particularly for those people who are freelancers or who in reality are self-employed but choose to pay themselves by dividends through a limited company. There are still some people slipping through the net and we are doing our best to support those.
“Specifically for tourism, as I say, it’s been a matter of keeping them afloat. I met with a number of businesses in August and September when the restrictions were less difficult for Cleethorpes and in the main, they are ticking over. I spoke to a B&B owner on Albert Road only a couple of weeks ago. They have a lot of contractors, and many of those are still continuing to work. But I recognise that more needs to be done and we keep up the pressure.”
Ms Nici said: “We don’t have a huge amount of businesses that are not public owned in the centre of Grimsby, so as far as my inbox is concerned, I haven’t had a great deal of questions from tourism businesses apart from travel agents; a couple of locally-owned travel agents I’ve been trying to support – they’ve been hit hard by the pandemic, and also wedding businesses. There isn’t anything sector-specific for them but as a business they are eligible for not only central government support but the support that came through local government as well. It is not ideal in any way, shape or form but of course they are the particular businesses that really can’t operate in other ways. Retail has been agile and have begun trading online, but they are two sectors that have been hit hard, and the sooner we can get out of this, the better. From a pure tourism point of view, we are lucky in that respect. I have three businesses I’ve been working with and I’m thankful it’s just three to specifically support and not tens, if not hundreds. Most of Grimsby’s jobs are essential roles – healthcare, food production, and energy production – so from that point of view, very few people in Grimsby have lost their jobs or had hours reduced.”
Mr Vickers added that it is, and will be, important to capitalise on people looking to holiday in the UK rather than risking booking overseas trips when there are so many uncertainties.
“The council and the LEP, working with the tourism businesses in Cleethorpes, could perhaps produce publicity to highlight that, and provide a real focus on getting people to holiday in Cleethorpes or indeed the wider area,” he said. “Going up to Barton, for example, you’ve got all the wildlife and so on, and you can go out into the Wolds. I think we can put together an offer for northern Lincolnshire.”
The issue of Brexit border chaos, with food goods being confiscated by officials, was raised.
Ms Nici said: “I’ll give you the impolite answer first – France needs to stop messing about, quite frankly. A lot of our problems are the French border agencies. Martin and I have been on many calls in the last two weeks where we’ve heard of goods – fresh goods in particular – being stopped because they don’t like the colour of the ink that’s been written on some of the paperwork, that they’re not crossing a line out in the way they want the line crossed out… some really petty things going on, and DEFRA is working morning, noon and night to make sure this doesn’t continue.
“I have to say, having had probably at least six meetings with DEFRA ministers and the Secretary of State, what we are hearing on the news is significantly inflated by the Remainer Press. Yes, there are some difficulties, but DEFRA is being very robust and talking to the French agencies about what’s happening. It suits the news to say that companies aren’t exporting the same amount but sadly at the moment they won’t. While your French, Italian and Spanish restaurants aren’t open, nobody is eating seafood that we export, so it’s very difficult to cut through in the media the reality of what’s going on. Our Remainer agenda media outlets aren’t interested in listening to the balanced story.
“Obviously from a quota point of view, we’d have liked to have had more quota in specific species, but a lot of our east coast fishers actually work on international swaps with EU organisations; in the next couple of weeks that will be organised so that will make sure the quotas will be at least the same.
“The important thing from the fishing deal we’ve got is we have control over the waters again. I don’t think we would have got control over our waters if we’d pushed any harder, and that is absolutely the key to be able to grow the industry. From my point of view it wasn’t just fishing and fishing waters; we also had to have a deal that worked for our fish processors. As for the people who have hounded me on social media about how terrible everything is, the reality is that in Grimsby less than 100 people – vastly less – are employed in catching fish, but well over 5,000 are employed in processing fish, so there had to be a balance of the two.”
Responding to a question about defence investment, Mr Vickers said: “We have made great strides and a 3% commitment. We have two new carriers on stream, and I think the public has a great deal of goodwill for the military. The present circumstances can do nothing but enhance that – clearly, they are playing a crucial role in combating the virus, delivering vaccines and so on. I’m sure we will see them in action again dealing with floods and other natural disasters we will probably come across in the next month or two. Ben Wallace is a very good Defence Minister, and he has a good team behind him. Two or three of them have been in military service.”
Mr Vickers also responded to a question regarding the cost of annual Covid vaccines which, if each dose cost £2, could tot up to a yearly bill of £200-million. “£200-million is a tiny bit of the NHS budget, which is around £140-billion per year,” he replied, “and it goes up inexorably, and every government of every complexion in every year of the NHS’s existence has increased the budget.”
“We are vastly ahead of the whole of Europe as far as vaccinations (rates) are concerned,” added Ms Nici.
The topic of the loss of the Royal Yacht Britannia to the country was raised, and if there should be a reintroduction of such a vessel in the context of a trade advantage.
“It’s a great shame that we lost the Royal Yacht, but public opinion at the time and the media meant that it was bound to be axed,” said Ms Nici. “But I think that now we’ve left the EU and we are back on the world stage in our own right, we do need to think about these things and how we want to be represented across the world – what kind of UK are we going to become? That comes down to the Government and people’s attitudes.
“We need to get back to some of the entrepreneurship that made our country great. If not a royal yacht, perhaps something akin to that, that we can use to send our business and cultural message out around the world. It could be a very powerful symbol.”
The session was hosted by the Great Grimsby Conservatives Association (https://www.grimsbyconservatives.org.uk or https://www.facebook.com/GrimsbyConservatives) and Cleethorpes Conservatives Association (https://www.cleethorpesconservatives.org.uk or https://www.facebook.com/CleethorpesConservatives).
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