FRIDAY was another significant day for Hartlepool.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson and the leader of the Labour party, Sir Keir Starmer, paid a second visit of the month on the same day.

Hartlepool is certainly in the spotlight ahead of its by-election on May 6.

Not since Stuart Drummond, under the guise of H’Angus the Monkey, was elected mayor in 2002 has it caught the political headlines quite like this.

There are other reasons why it is important too. With various national media outlets focusing attention on what the coastal town has to offer. Hartlepool College of Further Education is being lauded for the part it plays in getting people into work.

The college’s principal, Darren Hankey, who also sits on the North-East England Chamber of Commerce’s Council , thinks Hartlepool is overdue being acknowledged for the good work that goes on.

Leicester-born Mr Hankey, a former Sunderland University student who has been in Hartlepool since 2001, has offered The Northern Echo his thoughts on the recent attention his own college has received and why it is important going forward.

“In the last ten days or so the college has been mentioned on Radio Four’s Today programme, we were on BBC Five Live with Anna Foster and Tony Livesey, BBC Newsround, the national BBC News and next week we will be on Victoria Derbyshire’s programme again,” said Mr Hankey.

“We had a visit from deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner. Boris Johnson was at Hartlepool United on Friday where he met some of the youth team footballers enrolled here at our college.

“Stuart Drummond, in his radio interview on Thursday, said he was sick and tired of people talking the town down and this presents an opportunity for us all to be positive about Hartlepool. Like the work we do at our college.

“At the start of the week we were mentioned by James Kirkup in an article he wrote in The Times tied in with the by-election.

“He must have remembered what we spoke about when I participated in a round table with him and lots of other people from the sector and his Social Market Foundation think-tank last year. Properly funded schemes are the answer to the skills gap.

“Then there was a report just this week stating how parents are now thinking about vocational and technical education rather than the more familiar A-levels and university route. We have a track record for high quality here and it’s been great to be in the spotlight.

“I left school with three O-levels, went straight into work and realised my three O-levels wouldn’t help me progress into the world of work. I went back to night school. In 1988 I went to Leicester College, did four years there, got two more GCSEs, A-levels, and those four years transformed my life. Further education is transformational.

“That is why we get out of bed every day to go to work at Hartlepool College. We don’t speak to prospective students about what we do, we talk about why we want to transform students’ lives – and that’s why we have been in the spotlight so much this week too.

“Leicester College transformed my life. It took me when I was a kid who had grown up on a council estate, with free school meals all the way through to where I am now, ultimately being a Principal of a college in Further Education.

“FE Colleges have always been viewed as the Cinderella sector: Schools, colleges and universities are always the ones that went to the party. That narrative has always been around. That is why it is so pleasing to see us get the attention – not just for us but for all of the FE Colleges out there. We have had this attention, the mentions, in the newspapers, on national radio, The Times, on TV. It is not necessarily normal for Hartlepool College but it’s not normal for colleges per se. Now going forward there are three things I would like to see after this.

“We have big ticket items; like the Tees Valley’s freeport and Hartlepool will be part of it. We want that to manifest itself. We want more investment and for that to result in jobs on the ground.

“Secondly, I would like support for anchor institutions like colleges as they are good for the economy.

“In 2015 there was a bit of research done by the Government. It stated ‘for every one pound you invest in Further Education, it brings 20 pound in’. Therefore, it is an investment. It is not squandered money. It’s an investment in people; those people are less likely to be involved in crime as well as being healthier, it is a social investment as well as an economic one.

“And, thirdly, our economy in Hartlepool is made up of micro and small businesses requiring extra help – particularly as we emerge from the coronavirus. Hopefully the micro businesses will get the support they need.

“The analogy I use … look at the weather today (glorious sunshine). The weather tonight, colder – weather forecasters will say bring the plants in with the frost.

“Hartlepool is a bit like that flower and plant you have out, it needs the encouragement to flourish and grow. Those three things I talk about will enable that.”