Time to close the House of Horrors for good

A new kind of performance

Alas, we got so near.

The lights were switched off, the tarpaulins were draped over idle sets and the doors bolted.

Outside, beyond the car park, the Abominable Showman and his supporting cast of plenty were thumbing lifts to their next playground.

After five years, the Westminster House of Horrors was closed. Done. Finished.

And then a gavel landed in New York, The Donald cried foul (again) and his ally from across the pond sought to kill some time before #45’s July sentencing date.

Which would have been fine if he’d just buggered off to a quiet corner in his local.

Life, though, is rarely so generous.

And so down again thunked the UK political caravan of chaos’ legs, Nigel Farage – PT Barnum with a pint in one hand and a bottle of Brexit snake oil in the other – back for another self-indulgent tilt at Westminster.

Of course, as you’re reading this, dear old Nige may well now be Clacton’s MP, which, having flunked seven previous election attempts, would at least mark a triumph for perseverance.

But what then?

You really think he’s going to be bothered about the everyday irritations of Clacton’s potholes, potential community centre closures and ensuring local bus services keep on running?

Nah, me neither.

A far more likely outcome of his posturing will be years of Tory struggle, thanks to Reform’s snatch and grab of blue rosettes.

Not that the party needed much help in burying itself in the weeks leading to the election.

When his comms team sent him to Chesham United Football Club, all Rishi Sunak had to do was have a kickabout with some kids.

Instead, after stumbling through a simple cone drill, he took his ball and bagged enough own goals – not least his astonishing D-Day gaffe – to make Richard Dunne, the titan of Premier League defensive calamities, look a clueless novice: ‘here’s what real friendly fire looks like, son. Watch and learn…’

And all after being drenched by the rain – and drowned out by D:Ream.

He tried, but it’s hard to pin a Captain Chaos caricature on your greatest rival when you’re behaving like General Disarray.

But what of Starmer, I hear you ask?

Was he effusive? No. Was he charismatic? No.

He was, of course, Mr Functional, a sensible and steady beige M&S sweater in an unpredictable summer, who plodded through his campaign with enough catchphrases to at least make Farage’s mate Roy Walker smile.

Yet after Johnson’s nonsense, Truss’ blunderbuss and Sunak’s blowback, boring wouldn’t necessarily represent a poor turn.

Labour is far from a political panacea.

But a change of Westminster administration (I write before the election, when the party was predicted to gain a huge majority) would at least allow for a refreshing of thinking and policy, and an opportunity to deliver some performance after years of the performative.

And that includes for the North East too.

With two mayors now in situ, the region has an opportunity to strike out decisively and deliver watershed economic and social change.

And that will only be helped by a stable Westminster.

Make Hitachi a priority

One of the new Government’s immediate areas of focus must be Hitachi’s 750-job train building factory in Newton Aycliffe, County Durham.

Opened to great fanfare nearly a decade ago, and initially home to a number of flagship domestic contracts, its order book is drying up fast.

Both the Tories and Labour took to its shopfloor in the weeks before election campaigning with promises to revive its fortunes, the latter’s plan wrapping around a wider railway nationalisation programme.

That will take time, but the seconds are ticking for Hitachi.

Action must be prompt; letting a company in the cradle of the railway succumb to an early death would be unforgiveable.

Energising a post-coal future

Better news at Port of Tyne, where LS Eco Advanced Cables’ hopes to create a £923 million high-voltage cable factory.

Described as the “world’s largest” plant of its type, the company – a joint venture between Global InterConnection Group and a subsidiary of Korean cable maker LS Group – says it would deliver “dependable zero-carbon energy” by removing a “bottleneck in energy transition”.

Planning permission could be secured this year, ahead of production beginning in 2027.

All very positive and another sizeable tick in the region’s sustainability box.

The North East has long talked about a post-coal economy, and with projects from Teesside to Northumberland complementing support for headline programmes like Dogger Bank wind farm, that vision is becoming increasingly real.

But we cannot become complacent; we must continue creating the conditions – the land, the skills, the transport links, the wider economic opportunities – that catch and keep investors’ eyes.

A welcome change

It was refreshing to see England’s men and women take to St James’ Park recently.

For too long, the men’s football team has been anchored to Wembley as the game’s governing body seeks to recoup the stadium’s substantial redevelopment costs.

But the sport shouldn’t be limited to one ground and one city; the women’s team has toured the country for a number of years and the impact on the sport has been huge.

The men played at Middlesbrough and Sunderland when the old Wembley was being bulldozed and rebuilt, and the effect was similar, with packed houses desperate to watch household names in the flesh.

And it’s not just the footballing experience; games provide a great economic and cultural boost to host cities and towns too.

But money talks, which means Harry Kane & Co’s North East visit will highly likely be an exception, than, sadly, the beginning of any new normal.