Mr Toby Perkins

Mining has long been deeply woven into the practical and cultural fabric of people’s lives in Chesterfield, as it has in all mining communities. I need only look out of the window of the Labour club where I base my constituency office to be confronted with the former Derbyshire Miners’ Association offices, and the statues of Chesterfield’s first two miner MPs. Indeed, until the election of Tony Benn in 1984, every Member of Parliament for Chesterfield in the 20th century had been a former collier. My hon. Friend the Member for Blyth and Ashington (Ian Lavery) spoke about the educational role of the National Union of Mineworkers. That is one of the many legacies that have been lost as coalmining has disappeared. The union had a real commitment to making sure that its members were educated to the highest standards. Evidence of mining in Chesterfield and Derbyshire ranges from tragic memorials to miners lost in our various tragedies to the dwindling number of miners’ welfare clubs and former offices on Saltergate. They serve as a reminder of the past—a window into a time when the region was dominated by the pits and the opportunities that they provided. It is important, however, that this debate also focuses on the future for coalmining areas, and on investments, such as the investment in junction 29A secured by my former colleague Dennis Skinner. It means that more people are now employed on the old Markham pit site than ever worked underground there. This timely debate reminds us that the former coalfield areas, cruelly put out of use by the industrial vandalism of the Thatcher Government, have never been satisfactorily repurposed in any strategic way by subsequent Governments. The Coalfields Regeneration Trust recently reflected on the impact on health, not just for those with an industrial legacy, but for the one in five people in my constituency who are out of work due to long-term sickness. The same proportion have no formal qualifications. Those statistics paint a picture of what can happen when industry retreats from an area and no plan is made for what happens next. I have heard former Conservative MPs talking about a benefits culture, but who created that? It was, of course, the Thatcher Government, putting all those miners out of work and expecting them to go on to incapacity benefit. The coalfields are fighting back, however. I pay tribute to John Burrows, the former Derbyshire NUM president and leader of Chesterfield borough council for six years, and his successor, Tricia Gilby. They were successful in attracting £25 million in town deal funds from the previous Government, and the dedication and success of the Staveley town deal board, of which I have been a proud member for the last five years, has brought about welcome investment that will support Staveley to support itself through the regeneration that we need. However, I agree with colleagues that what we need is not occasional little pots of money, but a long-term strategic plan for re-energising coalfield communities. They are very different from cities, which Governments tend to find it easier to get investment into. We desperately need the new Government’s industrial strategy to speak to the needs of constituents like mine, and to set out a thought-through plan for coalfield communities. I see a real opportunity for coalfields to be at the vanguard of the green revolution. The Government’s “clean power by ’30” mission alone will unlock £40 billion of investment a year and create thousands of skilled jobs. The coalfields have kept the lights on in this country over the last century, and there is so much opportunity for them to be at the forefront of doing that again. The people of Chesterfield have a proud history of working hard to keep the lights on, and they can keep that noble tradition going.