Conservatism is driving Teesside’s revival – and it can do the same across Britain
7 min read
Not long ago, if you had stood on the edge of the old steelworks site in Redcar, the view would have told you everything you needed to know about how this part of the country had been treated.
Towering above you would have been the rusting remains of an industrial giant, now silent and skeletal, a monument to what had been lost. Thousands of jobs were gone, communities hollowed out, ambition replaced by apathy. The skyline offered no promise of renewal, and there was no plan for what came next. For too many people, the only future on offer was one that involved moving away to chase opportunity elsewhere, or accepting a handout and a pat on the head.
That was never going to be good enough. Not for the people here, and not for me.
Today, that same site is being transformed. It is now home to Europe’s largest offshore wind monopile factory, with more to come. Hydrogen, carbon capture, and clean industrial technologies are taking root. The skyline has changed, and with it, so has the outlook. You can feel the ambition again. You can see it in the cranes, hear it in the sound of construction, and feel it in the conversations happening every day with investors, engineers, apprentices, and families. This is not theory or spin. It is real. It is jobs, investment, and pride.
And none of it happened by accident. It happened because we made a conscious decision to reject decline as destiny, and we set about doing the hard, unglamorous work of building something better. We didn’t wait for permission from Whitehall. They gave us the powers, and we just got on with it. That is what conservatism means to me – not abstract ideology or academic theory, but practical delivery rooted in the people and places that make this country work.
When I was first elected Mayor in 2017, few in Westminster had any expectations. Places like Teesside, Darlington, and Hartlepool were seen as peripheral – perhaps important once, but now filed under “legacy problem”. The old Blairite model was still the default: shut down industry, send kids off to university whether it suited them or not, and hope the low-wage service economy in the cities could carry the load. And if that didn’t work, there was always the benefits system to mop up the human cost.
Well, we’ve lived through that model. We know its effects. And it doesn’t work.
What we’ve built in Teesside is a clear and unapologetic alternative. It’s a model that puts enterprise and local knowledge at the centre, that cuts red tape, backs businesses, and restores pride in place. It doesn’t pretend that government has all the answers, but it recognises that government can and should remove the obstacles that prevent people from making things happen. We do not try to do everything and end up doing it all badly. We focus on what matters – economic regeneration – and we do it well.
The engine of our progress has been Teesworks, the UK’s largest industrial regeneration project. On a site where the Redcar steelworks once stood – left derelict when the plant was closed in 2015 – we have taken 2,000 acres of contaminated land and brought them back into productive use. That has not been easy. But we did not treat the land as a heritage site for nostalgia tours. We treated it as an opportunity. And through genuine partnership – between the public and private sectors, between government and business, between local leaders and international investors – we have brought it to life.
Today, Teesworks is attracting billions in investment and creating thousands of good, skilled jobs. The SeAH Wind facility alone is employing over 2,000 people, manufacturing the foundations for the next generation of offshore wind turbines. And that is just one part of a broader transformation that includes the UK’s first Freeport, new railway stations, an expanded airport, major town centre regeneration, and a pipeline of investment that is helping Teesside lead in industries like hydrogen, logistics, and advanced manufacturing.
We’ve done all this while keeping taxes low. I’ve never raised a mayoral precept, and I never will. I don’t believe you grow a region by picking the pockets of the people trying to build it. When you believe in aspiration, you have to reward it. Creating new layers of bureaucracy and calling it levelling up is the opposite of what we need. We need clarity, urgency, and a willingness to say that sometimes the best thing a politician can do is get out of the way.
At the core of what we’ve done are three principles that I believe should be at the heart of a modern Conservative agenda: empowerment, pragmatism, and localism.
And yes, I’ve been criticised for being too cavalier. But my response is simple: tell that to the families across Teesside whose lives have been changed because they now have jobs, opportunities, and a future. Tell it to the apprentice on the Teesworks site who is earning a wage and learning a trade, rather than being sent on another training course that goes nowhere. I won’t apologise for delivery. I won’t apologise for doing the job I was elected to do.
At the core of what we’ve done are three principles that I believe should be at the heart of a modern Conservative agenda: empowerment, pragmatism, and localism.
Empowerment means giving people the tools to succeed. That’s why we’ve invested in skills, training centres, apprenticeships and technical education. If you are growing up in Teesside today, you don’t have to leave home to find a good job. You can stay, build a life, and contribute to something meaningful right here.
Pragmatism means doing what works. We’re not interested in left-versus-right, or public-versus-private. If a public pound unlocks private investment, we spend it. If the private sector can deliver faster and better, we bring it in. This is not about ideology. It is about outcomes.
And localism means trusting people who know their area. Decisions made in Whitehall will always lag behind reality on the ground. In Teesside, we move faster, we target better, and we live with the consequences of our decisions – so we make sure they are the right ones.
We have achieved all this by creating an environment that investors want to come to. When we cut red tape, build infrastructure, and back enterprise, the private sector follows. That is how we turn public investment into something real – not just a line in a spreadsheet, but a crane in the sky.
We’ve also stood up against a model of growth that relies on importing cheap labour to keep wages low. That is not a strategy; that is a shortcut. And it sells our own people short. Britain needs to build its industrial base, not hollow it out. We need to invest in training and skills, not open the door to undercutting. We should be creating opportunities here, not exporting them to the lowest bidder.
Labour talks a good game about fairness, but too often it means more bureaucracy, more reports, more consultations, and more taxes. We’ve seen that film before, and it always ends the same way – with working people squeezed and proud communities told to be realistic. But Teesside has shown that realism and ambition are not opposites. In fact, they go hand in hand.
Because what people want – in Teesside, in Yorkshire, in the Midlands and the North West – is not politics as performance. They want competence and momentum. They want change they can see and touch. And that’s what we’ve delivered.
So I say this to anyone still wondering whether the Teesside model works: come and see it for yourself. Come and see the cranes. Talk to the workers. Visit the new factories and the transformed sites. Speak to the investors and the apprentices. And then tell me this can’t be done elsewhere. Because it can. And it should.
What we’ve built is not the end of the story. There is more to do. More to build. More people to reach. But what we’ve shown is that with the right leadership, a clear plan, and the courage to get on with it, a place that was written off can lead again.
That is conservatism. That is Teesside. And it is exactly what the rest of the country needs.
