Mail Weekly Column: 22 January 2024
I’m delighted that Homes England have now approved a £24.8million funding agreement to deliver the Marina Village development in Barrow, creating over 800 new homes. The Village – which is vital to the plan to secure Furness’ future – also include a nature conservation area and new public spaces.
This is part of the #TeamBarrow programme of work, bringing together the Government (led by the Cabinet Secretary), Westmorland & Furness Council, BAE, and myself. It will ensure that Furness is in the best position to deliver the AUKUS submarine programme, and that the wider peninsula benefits from that multi-decade project.
There’s plenty more to do in Team Barrow, but this announcement is an important marker in delivering for Furness. Huge credit and many thanks to W&F Council, Homes England, and the team at The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities for getting this over the line.
My meetings with a number of Ministers this week included one with the Transport Secretary to press for progress on essential improvements to the A595, the A590 and the Furness Line. All of these are crucial to Team Barrow, and will affect its success. Team Barrow’s next meeting will be to prepare, ahead of the budget, the fight for proper financial support for our area, with the submarine programme providing a real catalyst for change.
Also during the week I received a reply from the Prime Minister to my letter asking that Barrow be granted Royal Town status. Within it, he acknowledged Barrow’s ‘long and proud history of shipbuilding, contributing greatly to the continued protection of our shores’. This is great news. Hundreds of you have already signed up to back this project. If you’d like to add your support, do sign up on https://www.simonfell.org/royalbarrow
During Energy Questions, I took the opportunity to promote the Morecambe Bay Net Zero project. This would employ the disused gas infrastructure under Morecambe Bay, based out of Barrow, for carbon capture and storage. This could store a gigaton of carbon, helping some of our most energy-intensive industries through the transition period. I continue to be really excited at the potential of the Cumbrian Energy Coast and will continue to champion it in Parliament at every opportunity.
My first proper office in Westminster was in Norman Shaw North, a faded beauty of a building across from the Houses of Parliament, but suffering from neglect, leaks, and more.
Soon, the building was closed for refurbishment and all occupants were dispersed elsewhere. For months, it has been undergoing remedial works and some modernisation to turn it back into a viable office space.
Its original slates were extracted in the 1880s from the Burlington Quarry in Kirkby-in-Furness. Their famous colour - Westmorland Green - remained, but sadly many had begun to show severe decay. So I was delighted to visit the site and learn that the new roof will come from the same source - with Burlington Stone’s Westmorland Green slate used once again: a lovely link to the building’s past, and a little bit of Furness in the heart of Westminster.
As usual, I ended the week with a lively and varied constituency surgery. If you would like to speak to me about something, please do email me: simon.fell.mp@parliament.uk or call 01229 314 220.
