Robin Blair has been behind his fruit and vegetable stall since he was three months old – in a carrycot under the till where his mother worked. Now 77, his is one of the last businesses in the historic market in Darlington, the “red wall” town won by the Tories in 2019, where Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak will hold their north-east hustings on Tuesday evening.
Cost of living questions look set to dominate the rest of the campaign. In Darlington, energy bills are predicted to rise to almost 15% of the average household’s income after tax.
Blair says he has been through tough times in the past but admitted he was apprehensive about the catastrophic price rises this winter. “I think the government’s got to get its hand in its pocket – when things are good, they are quick to put taxes up,” he says. “Our biggest worry is fuel; we are growers as well, old-fashioned market gardeners.”
He is fearful too for the future of the town and the empty shops on the high street. Trendy bars and cafes have opened in the old townhouses in Darlington’s attractive streets, but there are gaping holes in the large retail spaces that only big brands can afford.
For business owners and shoppers on the high street, there is a shake of the head at the idea that government cannot give more help with bills and a sense of inevitability that it will have to come anyway. Earlier in the day, Truss doubled down on her refusal to offer significant help to people with soaring energy bills this winter.
David Jackson, the last butcher in the market hall, has some cautious praise for the Conservatives’ new MP in the town, Peter Gibson. But he says his business is facing “astronomical” costs. “People aren’t going to be able to pay their bills. It’s simple,” he says. He broadly hopes Sunak will win: “He was chancellor, he should know something.”
Outside on the main shopping thoroughfare, David Eeles says his health depends on machines that need electricity, having already seen his bills go up to £200 a month.
His daughter Sue McQuillen, recently returned from living in Turkey, is scathing about the help on offer from the government. “We have not kept any of our national assets, not energy firms, water, not car manufacturing. All the billions in profits these companies are making are not even staying here.”
Darlington has totemic status for the Conservatives. In 2017, the pollster John Curtice tipped it as the seat that would clinch Theresa May’s new and bigger majority.
Instead Labour held the seat and May lost her majority. One member of the shadow cabinet remarked at the time that the biggest achievement of the 2017 campaign was not winning Canterbury but holding Darlington, especially after the Conservative victory in the Tees Valley mayoralty.
In 2019, the constituency instead heralded doom for Labour, knocking out the shadow minister Jenny Chapman. But a number of people in the town say they believe the town will flip back red again – without saying explicitly they will change their vote.
Emma Kane, a beautician, and her husband, Adam, who works in manufacturing, say they consider their household income to be comfortable and even they are worried about the coming price rises.
Both say they are unsure voting Labour would make a huge difference. “Labour spend a lot of time saying what is wrong, rather than having solutions,” she says.
There is a determination from the Conservatives to hold the seat – and the seat received particular attention from Sunak as chancellor, whose Richmond constituency makes him a close neighbour. Last year, Darlington was the chosen location for “Treasury North” – a new economic campus for the department.
That move is a source of civic pride in the town but some are sceptical local people will benefit from the new jobs – and the announcement has already had an effect on house prices.
Elizabeth Hackwell says she is deeply sceptical of “local boy” Sunak, calling him “a chancellor who wouldn’t pay tax and put ours up”. She says Darlington will “go back to Labour” but says people were angry the vote for Brexit had been ignored. “Boris has done that and we can move on now.”
For Labour, it is a tough fightback, having also lost the council in 2019, and there is internal gloom about the prospect of winning back control next year. Chris McEwan, a long-serving councillor, says the party has been undone by “Brexit, Corbyn and complacency” and the third of these is the toughest still to tackle.
He says Labour has got “a way to go” in communicating its offer to people. “We need to focus more on the energy companies – these are abnormal profits. The government should intervene and I do not believe they are willing to do that. This is for the good of the economy.”
McEwan says the impact of the cost of living crisis is now so bad in parts of the city that mutual aid groups from Covid times involving local churches and charities have been repurposed as emergency assistance for those plunged into poverty by mounting costs.
He says the town still has a strong sense of community and that Labour can show it is on their side. “There’s a major crisis coming but we have still got skin in the game here. You can still go forward. We have a great population – and a great history.”
