Setting out your own levelling up pledges in the poster child town for the ruling opposing party’s pilot programme is a bold move.
But brave and bold look set to be key words as thoughts turn to campaigns with the election cycle truly at mid-term and a Prime Minister on the ropes.
Sir Keir Starmer, ahead in the polls as Partygate, PPE and other Covid calamities refuse to clear the Downing Street door, made a dash to Grimsby to back his levelling up shadow minister Lisa Nandy’s first pledge.
Read more: Decarbonisation? Humber has it all mapped out on route to Net Zero
Scorning his own missed opportunity of an Orsted tour due to a Sue Gray delay, but told he was welcome back any time, he endorsed the fact that young people “shouldn’t have to get out to get on” - a factor being pushed hard in North East Lincolnshire.
Ms Nandy had heard how investment in green technology is providing secure, well paid jobs for local people in offshore wind, with 400 to be employed below the Dock Tower once the latest wind farm zones are complete.
But with evidence of a brain drain still a problem, and stark issues within communities within walking distance of the £14 million Danish investment on the port, there appears still a big job to do.
The Grimsby Town Deal was heralded as huge - and may well still be. But disillusionment with the connectivity to Westminster has been voiced - and here a whiff of getting a brick back in the Boris-bashed red wall emerges.
Ms Nandy, who had also put herself forward for party leader when Jeremy Corbyn stepped down after the 2019 general election defeat, opened a debate held at Docks Academy, a venue held up regularly as one of Grimsby’s green shoots.
Chaired by Melanie Onn, who lost her Great Grimsby seat to Lia Nici that December night, she said “For far too long, young people have had to move far away from their homes and their loved ones, just to find decent opportunities. They are faced with choosing between family and home versus opportunity and secure work. When they move to cities, they take their spending power with them.
“People shouldn’t have to get out to get on. We have seen today that with the right investment, jobs and opportunities are beginning to thrive in Grimsby.
“We need to turbo boost this. The Government has made big promises - but any plan must ensure that people don't have to get out to get on.
“The next Labour government will build a new Britain, matching the ambition people have for their community, with a real plan to deliver well-paying jobs and skills for young people in towns like Grimsby.”
Handing communities “the power and the money to decide what they need” is seen as key. Sir Keir wouldn’t be drawn on where this could sit, flagging up important leadership as key - a theme echoed at the table. He recognised Grimsby’s strong identity but it is the difficult marriage at regional development level that some may see as hindering. Economically it is the Humber, yet ‘Humberside’ still makes politicians and many voters shudder.
Administratively Grimsby and Cleethorpes now look south to Lincoln, with dotted lines into the Humber for freeports, energy and other big ticket necessities.
And while major nationally-significant infrastructure projects can dominate, with elected mayors and power struggles taking up column space, the visit was about the macro-level too.
Ms Nandy had used the work of community group East Marsh United in a foreword for a report recently penned, and Billy Dasein was at Docks Academy representing the organisation.
“It is really encouraging for us,” he said of her outline. “We lost the fishing industry, the Humber Bank factories were starting to dwindle away and suddenly we had lots of people who didn’t want to end up where they ended up.”
Crime, damage, absent landlords and, latterly, county lines gangs, brought those passionate about their part of the world together to find a solution. It is the part of the world that is the gateway to the gatehouses to the green power stations bringing about this huge attention - a fishing port re-energised by offshore wind.
“The simple thing to do was say we care,” Mr Dasein said. “We cleaned the streets every Saturday, sat together for two hours every Thursday, talked about what the problems were and what the solutions were. It was not one thing, not housing, not this and that, everything, all at once, all the time. We ended up struggling to manage arts, education, outreach and housing.”
Now it is aiming to deliver a community hall and take ownership of 100 homes. It has a few already.
“We are planning to re-think the East Marsh as a village, it being the warmest possible feeling about settlement and belonging. We are greening darkened streets.”
“My issue is there is still such a small town mentality, so levelling up is key,” said 18-year-old community fitness entrepreneur Bailey Greetham. “We struggle bringing fresh ideas, fresh regeneration in. We are at the end of the line, we are not getting everything everyone has got, people aren’t looking upon us as they do to other places.”
Having a hinterland that is 270 degrees water doesn’t help Nandos or Foot Locker beat a path to the door. Freshney Place being placed in the hands of receivers as he spoke served only to underline the point as he moved to aspiration.
Mr Greetham said: “I talk to people who say fish factory work will do. It will not. We need to work on the teaching offer, make sure opportunities available now are taught.
“We have green energy at scale, but often it is a case of ‘learn a skill or leave’. Why? We need to talk about careers, about finance, law and options instead of just factories and building sites.”
One force lifting the aspiration is indeed global offshore wind developer Orsted, with others like RWE and ABP - and a growing supply chain following.
Emma Toulson was born in the town and admitted she had to “go round the houses” before landing a top job in the formative industry, having studied in Durham and worked initially in Peterborough - as did Bailey as an initial Anglian Water apprentice.
“The opportunities are growing,” she said, having played a key role in the Sector Deal. “There are different skill levels required, people are coming from all different backgrounds and experiences. It takes time but it is building up. I think it is fantastic what has been achieved in a short space of time. We have seen so many more jobs, such diversity of roles and opportunities.
“A lot more offshore wind is coming in the future, and we need people to run it. The growth we need to get to the really bold targets is huge and it needs to be very, very rapid as well. There is a lot, lot more.”
And while appetite to join is high, awareness can be an issue. School programmes are ongoing, an all-singing all-dancing visitor centre is now open - but the battle can lay with parents in pockets of multi-generation poverty.
“We have apprenticeship programmes, we get a lot of applications, and there is a whole supply chain supporting us - that all need people. We are right at the top end of the dock, there is a security line between the town and the port, so very little is seen. There is a big obligation on us.”
To this end plans are in place to provide a more central exhibition of the industry that the town’s hopes are pinned upon - and that resonated with Sir Keir.
“People don’t aspire to something they don’t know anything about,” he said.
Architect Mark Hodson talked about the transformation seen in Hull itself having gone from a crisis of confidence to City of Culture.
This also chimed with the Labour leader, with Mr Hodson underlining the need for strong leadership. “It is about having the critical mass with a well known narrative,” he said. “A narrative and lyrics and we can all start to move forward.”
Green energy and wider decarbonisation of great industry seems to provide such a platform.
“City of culture was a most fantastic platform for Hull. We need to build confidence, we need to recognise a need for key leaders in this area,” he said.
MyEnergi is a home-grown success story for the area, and chief marketing officer Jordan Brompton joined the debate. She told how the new industrial revolution required an “army of engineers and coders, with apprenticeships so important,” prompting strong support for ‘levelling up’ the perceptions of academic and trade routes to rewarding careers..
“We don’t value things equally,” Sir Keir responded. “We don’t need a massive emphasis on not going or going to university. Skills are just as important, just as difficult and just as necessary.
“I feel very, very strongly about that. My dad was a toolmaker, he went straight into engineering and for the rest of his life looked down upon because he hadn’t gone to university.”
Returning to the Orsted visit, and those successfully entering an industry building continuously in the town since 2007, Ms Nandy told how she was taken by what she has heard from some “ridiculously excited ambassadors”.
“They are proud of what they are putting back into the community, it was one of the most powerful things I have seen,” she said of her time with the apprentices.
Of her role shadowing Michael Gove’s core remit in the delivery of the Conservative manifesto foundation once Brexit - not mentioned once - was achieved, she said she will be a “critical friend of government”. “I want them to succeed while challenging where they are going wrong and championing where they are getting it right,” she explained - putting the Grimsby location for the pledge launch into further perspective.
“We are not going to do this from Westminster or Whitehall. It is full of people pulling levers with no strings attached. Out in the country people are doing things. If change is going to come it is going to be driven by people themselves.
"With East Marsh United, rather than waiting, people stepped up and drove it for the future of the community and young people. That’s the future we believe in, government helping communities to help fulfil and realise their own ambitions.
“Personally I have skin in the game. I live in Wigan, my six year old is at school there, and in living memory it used to power the world. Too many now have to get out to get on.
“For some it is great, they want to explore the world, and for them we want to have choices, but part of that choice has to be to come home and have a good job and contribute, not to have to choose between work opportunities and love, home and family. Too many people tell us that is the settlement they are left with.
“That’s how we build this country, from the foundations up.”
