Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has made his first visit to the Treasury campus in Darlington, describing his first 50 days in the job as a rollercoaster, but he told North East businesses: Don't lose hope.
Speaking exclusively to The Northern Echo from his office in Feethams, Mr Hunt said: "This is not a terminal diagnosis. This is some medicine that's going to help us get through the next year and then we've got really bright prospects around the corner."
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Mr Hunt, whose first four businesses he set up in his twenties all failed, said he understood the challenges facing businesses after a tough Autumn statement, and his experience helped shape his policies.
"I know how vulnerable you are as a small business, and I think you're particularly vulnerable from the taxes you have to pay before you made a penny of profit. So things like business rates, VAT, Employers National Insurance, can be absolute killers. So I have that in the back of my mind."
During his visit, Mr Hunt confirmed more than £93m of Government money for the redevelopment of Darlington Railway Station. The Darlington Station Project has already been primed with £33m from the Tees Valley Combined Authority and Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen.
This next tranche of Government money follows previous commitments which take the total Government investment to £105m. The raft of improvements planned will improve capacity on the wider Tees Valley rail network and create better access to the East Coast Main Line.
Fifty days into the job he was given by Liz Truss and then retained under Rishi Sunak, Mr Hunt said: "It's not for me to give advice to people running their own businesses because you have to be a jack of all trades - prepared to do absolutely everything. But I think what I would say as Chancellor, is don't lose hope. The media focused on the bad news from the autumn statement, the taxes going up, spending being cut. But if you look at the forecasts, this time next year inflation is halved, the year after that you're seeing growth returning to a very healthy two to three per cent a year for the following three years. So there's actually a lot of hope in there."
Mr Hunt described life in the Cabinet as 'madness', but it was a role he couldn't turn down.
"It's obviously been a roller coaster," he said.
"I think the main thing that I thought was that being Chancellor was a bit like being the Finance Director in a business and it's all going to be about spreadsheets and numbers. But what I learned is that actually it's what you do with those numbers. It's actually about your values because this is a job that really makes you think hard about what you believe in. If I'm honest, that's been a surprise to me because that wasn't probably what I was expecting.
"In truth, it did take a lot of persuading, for me to go back to the madness of being in the cabinet, and it is mad. But if you've run your own business, and you know the things that you really want to change to make us one of the most competitive and successful economies in Europe, then you can't say no to a job like this. It's nothing but a privilege."
He was full of praise for the way the North East had taken to its status as the capital of Levelling Up, saying Darlington had been 'transformed'.
"The main reason to come here is because Treasury has relocated some people and is now along with other government departments, employing 500 people, the majority of whom are local. Sure - it's fantastic - but also the railway station, the freeport, the railway heritage quarter - and we've just been to the covered market for lunch. There's so much happening, and a real buzz.
"What did I come away thinking? I think people trust politicians for what they do rather than what they say. And the fact that the Treasury has actually said, we're not just going to talk about Levelling Up, we're going to actually start employing people in Darlington is a very positive sign.
"I think the next stage in the Levelling Up revolution, is to give more power to civic entrepreneurs, like Ben Houchen and Andy Street, so that they can solve more problems themselves, rather than having to come to Whitehall with a begging bowl, which is sometimes what happens.
"So I want to explore what we could do where we've got really inspired local leadership to set elected mayors and council leaders free - that is a big change, because our structures in the UK are very centralised and usually it ends up with someone having to come and ask the Treasury for something.
"So that will be a change of culture as much in London as it would be outside London. But I think that's the next step. And if you look at other countries which have spread opportunity more evenly, like Germany, or Japan or the United States, they have much more local freedom."
The Chancellor said he didn't regret the decisions he had to make, and that he had deeply-held motivations.
"I've had to do difficult things in my first autumn statement. But think of the thousands of things I could do to help people like me when I started my business at 24 because of Margaret Thatcher telling everyone to go out and become an entrepreneur. And I listened.
"So I think of anything I could do to help young people take that plunge, and if there are any younger people who read this interview, I really recommend setting up a business in your 20s. That's the time when you don't have a mortgage, you don't have kids. It doesn't matter if things go pear-shaped, and you can take risks and have fun. And that's what I did.
"I know there's another route, which is you can get experience in an industry and make the contacts and then you set up the business a bit later on. But I think it would be fantastic if we have more people going in really early."
The Chancellor told me allowing local authorities to increase Council Tax was an important element. He admitted 'there are no easy decisions' but he felt he had been fair in deciding how the economy's bills were paid.
"I totally understand how sensitive council tax levels are for people throughout the country," he said.
"But I also know people are very worried about what's happening in the NHS, including at Darlington Memorial Hospital, and if we are going to unblock our hospitals and allow ambulances to offload people, then we need to be able to discharge people into the community through the social care system.
"So we putting in nearly £5billion a year more into the social care system - not a sector that gets much love traditionally - but this is the biggest increase they've ever had in their history. About a third of that is being supported by local authorities and the rest of it is coming from central Government. And I didn't think it'd be fair to ask local authorities to do that without giving them some additional flexibility on council tax."
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