{"id":8137,"date":"2019-03-04T09:22:31","date_gmt":"2019-03-04T09:22:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/struggling-towns-to-get-1-6bn-post-brexit-boost\/"},"modified":"2019-03-04T09:22:31","modified_gmt":"2019-03-04T09:22:31","slug":"struggling-towns-to-get-1-6bn-post-brexit-boost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/struggling-towns-to-get-1-6bn-post-brexit-boost\/","title":{"rendered":"Struggling towns to get \u00a31.6bn post-Brexit boost"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div property=\"articleBody\">\n<figure class=\"media-landscape no-caption full-width lead\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><\/p>\n<p>                <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"js-image-replace\" alt=\"Children playing on swings in a playground\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/320\/cpsprodpb\/15F5B\/production\/_105874998_mediaitem105874997.jpg\" width=\"976\" height=\"549\"\/><span class=\"off-screen\">Image copyright<\/span><br \/>\n                 <span class=\"story-image-copyright\">Getty Images<\/span><\/p>\n<p>            <\/span><\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p class=\"story-body__introduction\">A \u00a31.6bn fund is being launched by the government to boost less well-off towns after Brexit.<\/p>\n<p>Prime Minister Theresa May said: &#8220;For too long in our country prosperity has been unfairly spread&#8230; but we want it to work for all communities.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>More than half of the money will go to the north of England and the Midlands to bring jobs and stimulate growth.<\/p>\n<p>Labour says it is a bribe to influence MPs in Leave-supporting areas to back Mrs May&#8217;s Brexit deal.<\/p>\n<p>In January, MPs rejected the withdrawal deal she has reached with the EU by 230 votes &#8211; the biggest defeat for a sitting government in history. <\/p>\n<p>To win another vote, which Mrs May has promised will be on or before 12 March, she could find herself relying on the votes of Labour MPs from Leave-voting parts of the country.<\/p>\n<p>John Mann, MP for Bassetlaw, a former coal mining area in Nottinghamshire, told the PM last month to &#8220;show us the money&#8221; with &#8220;transformative investment&#8221; in areas that voted to leave.<\/p>\n<p>The Labour MP, who backed Mrs May&#8217;s Brexit deal at the first vote, denied it amounted to &#8220;transactional politics&#8221;.<\/p>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-politics-32810887\" class=\"story-body__link\">Brexit: All you need to know<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-46318565\" class=\"story-body__link\">A really simple guide to all things Brexit<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But John McDonnell, Labour&#8217;s shadow chancellor, said the fund &#8220;smacks of desperation from a government reduced to bribing MPs to vote for their damaging flagship Brexit legislation&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Dismissing that claim, Housing and Communities Secretary James Brokenshire insisted the funding would be made available &#8220;regardless of the outcome [of the vote]&#8221;. <\/p>\n<p>He told BBC Radio 4&#8217;s Today programme the money would be dispersed &#8220;through until 2026&#8221;, adding: &#8220;These are focused funds, transformative funds, to invest in productivity that actually then supplement the work of councils and indeed other funds we have in place.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>However, Labour MP Alex Sobel, of the cross-party People&#8217;s Vote campaign, which wants a new referendum on Brexit, said it was &#8220;a drop in the ocean&#8221; compared with the cost of leaving the EU.<\/p>\n<p>He said the annual loss to local economies would be more than enough to wipe out any potential return from this scheme.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media-landscape has-caption full-width\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><\/p>\n<p>                 <span class=\"off-screen\">Image copyright<\/span><br \/>\n                 <span class=\"story-image-copyright\">Reuters<\/span><\/p>\n<p>            <\/span><figcaption class=\"media-caption\"><span class=\"off-screen\">Image caption<\/span><br \/>\n                <span class=\"media-caption__text\"><br \/>\n                    Theresa May, pictured with her husband Philip, has promised MPs another vote on her deal by 12 March<br \/>\n                <\/span><br \/>\n            <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Labour&#8217;s Ruth Smeeth, the MP for Leave-supporting Stoke-on-Trent, described the amount of money as &#8220;extraordinarily pathetic&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking on BBC Radio 4&#8217;s Westminster Hour programme, she said: &#8220;If you&#8217;re talking about national renewal, this is less money than is being taken out of my economy by the introduction of [new welfare system] universal credit over the next four years.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>But the prime minister insisted: &#8220;Communities across the country voted for Brexit as an expression of their desire to see change &#8211; that must be a change for the better, with more opportunity and greater control.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;These towns have a glorious heritage, huge potential and, with the right help, a bright future ahead of them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<hr class=\"story-body__line\"\/>\n<h2 class=\"story-body__crosshead\">Analysis: Is May buying votes? <\/h2>\n<p><strong>By BBC political correspondent Iain Watson<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>A month ago John Mann &#8211; who voted to leave the EU &#8211; told the BBC there was a &#8220;good dialogue&#8221; going on with the government.<\/p>\n<p>And he was hopeful Mrs May would come back with &#8220;something significant&#8221; for his, and other, areas outside London.<\/p>\n<p>He and a group of Labour MPs from Leave areas were demanding the protection of employment rights after Brexit &#8211; and assurances poorer areas wouldn&#8217;t lose out when EU regional funding ended.<\/p>\n<p>The cash on offer from the government is equivalent to less than 2% of English local authority spending.<\/p>\n<p>Theresa May says she is simply making good a promise she made in her first speech as prime minister to help &#8220;ordinary working class families&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>But the Labour leadership see this as a &#8220;bribe&#8221; to tempt some of their own MPs to break ranks and back Mrs May&#8217;s deal.<\/p>\n<p>The former Conservative, now Independent, MP Anna Soubry claims it&#8217;s an attempt to buy votes.<\/p>\n<p>But the government insists the true beneficiaries will be residents of coastal and industrial communities who feel left behind.<\/p>\n<hr class=\"story-body__line\"\/>\n<p>The \u00a31.6bn fund will be broken down into \u00a3600m, which communities in any part of the UK can bid for, and \u00a31bn allocated using a needs-based formula to the following areas:<\/p>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\">North-west England: <strong>\u00a3281m<\/strong>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\">North-east England: <strong>\u00a3105m<\/strong>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\">Yorkshire and the Humber: <strong>\u00a3197m<\/strong>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\">South-west England: <strong>\u00a333m<\/strong>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"story-body__unordered-list\">\n<li class=\"story-body__list-item\">South-east England: <strong>\u00a337m<\/strong>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The government said communities would be able to draw up job-boosting plans for their town, with the support and advice of their Local Enterprise Partnerships.<\/p>\n<p>It added that it would also seek to ensure towns in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland would benefit from the new funding.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/uk-47435565\">Source<\/a> by <a href=\"\">[author_name]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image copyright Getty Images A \u00a31.6bn fund is being launched by the government to boost less well-off towns after Brexit. Prime Minister Theresa May said: &#8220;For too long in our country prosperity has been unfairly spread&#8230; but we want it to work for all communities.&#8221; More than half of the money will go to the &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.styledeals.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}