Today sees the launch of a landmark partnership scheme designed to spearhead economic growth in the region and give a huge boost to delivering new jobs, homes and investment.
The Northern Gateway Partnership is a collaboration of seven local authorities and two local enterprise partnerships (LEPs). It consists of Cheshire East Council, Cheshire West and Chester Council, Stoke-on-Trent City Council, Newcastle-under-Lyme Borough Council, Staffordshire County Council, Staffordshire Moorlands District Council and Stafford Borough Council, Cheshire and Warrington LEP and Stoke and Staffordshire LEP.
It aims to unlock major new growth and investment opportunities which could deliver more than 100,000 new homes and 120,000 new jobs by 2040 by creating a new growth zone at the gateway to the Northern Powerhouse and Midlands Engine.
To drive the project forward, the two LEPs have signed an agreement committing them, supported by the wider network of local authority partners, to work together to ensure plan-led sustainable targeted growth and optimise the benefits of HS2 investment.
The Northern Gateway spans Cheshire and North Staffordshire including the city of Stoke on Trent, Crewe and the A500 corridor.
Councillor Michael Jones, Leader of Cheshire East Council, said: "This is a really exciting project that will be hugely economically significant – not just regionally but nationally.
"It marks a once-in-a-generation opportunity to help realise the full economic potential for the Cheshire/Staffordshire region that investment in HS2 brings. Moreover, a Northern Gateway Development Zone would help supercharge the Northern Powerhouse and help successfully rebalance the economy of UK plc.
"We are confident this joint growth strategy will become a national exemplar of strategy-led regeneration and development to deliver really significant jobs and growth."
The Transport Secretary, Patrick McLoughlin MP, has previously confirmed his intention to introduce a dedicated hybrid bill to bring HS2 to the North of England sooner than planned, subject to further analysis and decisions on the preferred route. The prospect of this investment in HS2 to the North is the catalyst for this new growth-focused partnership.
The Northern Gateway partners are also committed to capitalising immediately on the Cheshire/Staffordshire region's unique position as the bridging link between the Midlands Engine and the Northern Powerhouse.
Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire LEP chairman David Frost CBE said: "Staffordshire and Cheshire are in a pivotal location at the heart of the UK, linking the Midlands Engine with the Northern Powerhouse.
"This innovative new partnership represents a great opportunity with massive potential by working together to benefit local people by bringing jobs and growth to our area."
Christine Gaskell, Chair of Cheshire and Warrington LEP, said: "The Northern Gateway Partnership will put the North and the Midlands in a strong position to deliver nationally significant economic growth, capitalising on the opportunities and investment that will be generated by HS2.
"Committing to work across boundaries and regions will enable us to work together in a joined up and strategic way, with the backing of Government, to maximise our role in delivering the Northern Powerhouse and Midlands Engine."
Photo: Michael Jones, Leader of Cheshire East Council.
Comments
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I think all the HS2 money would be better spent on transport infrastructure in Manchester area and perhaps re opening the midland line to Derby.
There is much to recommend us as we are. Stick with it and take pride in preserving one of England's finest 'green and pleasant lands'.
"the bridging link between the Midlands Engine and the Northern Powerhouse." he tells us.
"Staffordshire and Cheshire are in a pivotal location", says another talking head. This is stating, as Basil Faulty would have said, "..the bleddin' obvious". What is new? Where is this bridge leading? And why?
Reading through the rest of this PR makes you realise just how farcical it all is and they are.
There is nothing new here, it is not "blue sky" thinking.
So, who are they trying to kid?
What we really,desperately require is a great dash of common sense together with sound economic thinking. Not this PR junk - this will never solve our underlying economic weaknesses
Where is the man/woman who can stand up, clear out the dead wood, time serving CEC leadership? Certainly not amongst the current CEC Tory yes men/women.
By the way, I am a life long Conservative but am blessed with the ability to see that our emperors, both local & national, have no clothes. Frightening, is it not?
I had rather hoped Engine of the North would be used to deliver brown sites across CEC, those posted on the SHLAA so clearly there with intention to develop. With Government incentives available there is so much potential here to put brown sites first, thus protecting the Green Belt. For the CEC Urban Potential Assessment to conclude only 14 houses can be built on brown sites in Wilmslow by 2030 is an appalling lack of vision given their refusal to develop the brown sites on the urban fringe and the sites that will come on line each year for the next 14 years. A determination to build only on brown should be at the core of CEC planning and Engine of the North could be just the business to achieve this policy.