‘Move the DoT and give us better roads’
NORTH of Tyne Mayor Jamie Driscoll has called for the Department of Transport to be moved to the North East – so that the region gets a fair share of transport investment.
He said the area that he serves, including Newcastle, Northumberland and North Tyneside, had no three-lane motorway at all.
But the region would never have been so neglected if the Department for Transport was based there instead of London, he said.
He was speaking at an event in Brighton, where Labour is holding its annual conference.
The mayor was discussing suggestions that moving government departments out of London would improve the way the country is governed.
He said: “The North of Tyne is a huge area. There is not a single metre of three-lane motorway.
“You can’t get from north to south or east to west without driving on single lane roads.
“But if the Department of Transport was based in Newcastle, nobody would have to lobby, we would just have roads and a decent transport system.
“So yes, send something to Leeds and Manchester. We’ll have transport in Newcastle thank you very much.”
Mr Driscoll also called for a change to the way that the Government allocates funding. At the moment, it usually spends money on projects that are expected to provide the biggest financial return, but in practice this tends to mean investment in areas that already have the strongest economies such as London and the South East.
Earlier this year, Prime Minister Boris Johnson insisted he wanted to “turbo-charge the North’s economy as we leave the European Union”, as he announced plans to build a new rail line across the Pennines.
Mr Johnson gave the green light to the first phase of the Northern Powerhouse Rail scheme, also known as Crossrail for the North, during a visit to Manchester. He said he backed the Power Up the North campaign launched by newspapers and websites including The Chronicle.
We are calling for an end to underfunding, more powers to be devolved from London, and for Central Government to stop taking the North for granted.