Who Cares about Hartlepool?



We talk to Adam Gaines, independent candidate in the

Hartlepool by-election

Scott Hunter

24 April 2021

In the week where Labour’s candidate for the Hartlepool by-election, Paul Williams, is having to defend his role in reorganising hospital services in the North Tees area, and his Conservative rival, Jill Mortimer, is busy dodging questions about the government’s plans regarding Liberty Steel, Tees Valley Monitor talks to one of the independent candidates, local business owner Adam Gaines.



The constituency of Hartlepool is an unusual one, where the previous MP, Labour’s Mike Hill, won the 2019 election with a minority vote, opposing votes being shared between the Conservatives and the Brexit Party. Richard Tice, the chair of the Brexit Party (now the Reform Party), stood as a candidate here. He took 25% of the vote in a town where there has been much criticism of candidates being ‘parachuted in’. It appears that the people of Hartlepool are somewhat conflicted about how to evaluate the new reality, where Labour can no longer take their support as a given.

We began by asking Adam Gaines what he considered to be the three main issues facing the town. Top of his list was child poverty. “Child poverty, especially child food poverty, is probably one the main challenges. Roughly about a third of kids in Hartlepool live in in [food] poverty, and that’s one of the highest in the country”, he reports. 

The second issue is creating jobs, and he believes his experience as an entrepreneur gives him some insight into that. As he says, “I don’t think many of the candidates have actually started a business in Hartlepool”. The third issue is what labels ‘neglect’, which he largely blames on the government for the impact that austerity has had in the town, which he says has resulted not only in services being cut, but also council tax being raised to compensate, putting an additional strain on household budgets.

On the matter of ‘neglect’ we question him further about Hartlepool’s experience of ‘levelling up’. He begins by commenting on work of the Tees Valley Authority (TVCA). English devolution and the establishment of combined authorities, of course, was really where ‘levelling up’ started. Of the funds that have gone to the TVCA, he says,

“Hartlepool hasn’t really seen its fair share of that … All the major projects are outside the area. You’ve got the airport and you’ve got [Teesworks]. So, all the money is basically being sucked into those two areas. Hartlepool has really been left out.”

Of funds that have come directly from government for regeneration projects - £2.8 million for the refurbishment of two buildings on the Headland – he criticises both the plans, which he says haven’t been properly scrutinised by businesspeople, and the (indirectly) the level of funding. He sees the need for a regeneration project on a much larger scale than the two already given the green light. Adam Gaines’ proposal is for there to be a business forum in Hartlepool where the feasibility of regeneration projects could be examined.

The unevenness of devolution is a theme he returns to when asked about the freeport. When we asked

“There has been a lot of discussion around the potential of the freeport to stimulate growth in this region. That would bring manufacturing and warehousing to the area. Is that sufficient for the regeneration of the town’s economy and to stem further outward migration?”

Adam was sceptical. “My bar, he says, “ is located right next to the Hartlepool part of that and I know people who work there, and basically what they’re saying to me is that most of the trade is going to go through Middlesbrough and the Hartlepool section of that is going to be left out.”

While this opinion is gleaned from casual conversation, he adds the observation that the fact that the Port of Hartlepool was bolted on to the freeport bid right at the last minute is an indication that it was an afterthought, and concludes, “I’m not convinced that [the freeport] will make much difference to the Hartlepool region.”

When it comes to the future of Liberty Steel, which employs 250 people in the town, is similarly unconvinced that the government is about to step in to save it.  He accepts the reassurance of people he speaks to who work at the mill that it should be profitable and is quick to assert the strategic importance of the UK steel industry. He goes on, “I would probably give [GFG Alliance, the owners of Liberty] the loan but tie it to the land, so that [if the company then collapses] they don’t have the problems they had at Redcar [Steel] where they had to go in and compulsory purchase it and there’s a massive time delay between the actual shutting down and then having to regenerate the … land.”

But he clearly appreciates that the government will decide, probably without the consulting the MP for Hartlepool, whoever that may be. And the underlying message that’s beginning to come through from Adam to the voters of Hartlepool is ‘don’t hold your breath for anyone to turn up to help the town out of its troubles’ (To put things in perspective, a few days after this interview the government announced that its press briefing room in 10 Downing Street was now being abandoned. That project cost £2.6 million, as compared to the £2.8 million allocated to Hartlepool for regeneration projects).

Adam’s economic programme is therefore geared heavily towards growing local business by improving business networks, attracting inward investment by demonstrating that the council, the MP, and the [TVCA] mayor are all pro-business, and, crucially, dealing with the fact that Hartlepool has no university. He observes that many of those who complete further education in the town, then attend universities elsewhere, which disadvantages the town economically because student populations constitute an important consumer base in any town, but also because those who could be the basis of a highly skilled workforce have already gone elsewhere at a young age, leaving the town with a workforce that is relatively low-skilled. He goes on to say, that, were there a university in the town, it would also provide businesses with the means to upskill their workforce.

The theme of mutual assistance by local people extends to his proposals for welfare. The fact that welfare features very prominently in the campaign of someone who is otherwise very focussed on business growth may come as a surprise, but it is a central plank of his campaign. He has pledged, if elected as MP, to commit half his salary to supporting programmes to alleviate food poverty in the town. This sounds very commendable, but it doesn’t stop there. He is proposing that all MPs do the same and has calculated that this would raise in excess of £26 million for food charities.

We raised the point that this was tantamount to giving someone a salary and then telling them how to spend it and wasn’t this a little unfair. We thought this was a killer argument. Adam didn’t. He responded to our point by saying that he thought that MPs had a particular responsibility towards the welfare of the communities they serve, and this salary sacrifice would perfectly express that.

Adam is aware that the odds are stacked against independent candidates in elections to parliament. But equally it is not unknown for insurgents to prevail in by-elections. One this is certain, which is that, should he become the MP for Hartlepool on 6 May, his proposals for salary sacrifice will immediately make him the most unpopular person in Westminster. Some people in Hartlepool might like that idea.