16:30 Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con)

It is six weeks to the day since at the levelling-up White Paper was published and LEPs have very much welcomed its conclusions. The value of LEPs is based on an array of evidence about their impact across the country, and a visit to any of their websites or social media platforms will demonstrate the huge amount of work that is under way. Only last week, the Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Chris Philp), who is the Minister with responsibility for the digital economy, was in Hull to launch the latest LEP local digital skills partnership, which equips people across Hull and East Yorkshire with the skills needed to support the region’s digital jobs boom and to ensure that more residents can benefit from the thriving local tech sector. LEPs are also home to, and work closely with, world-leading sector champions, from creative industries, cyber and net zero through to defence and space. LEPs are already bringing together critical clusters to support innovation and turbocharge growth.

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16:46 Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con)

I will go through a few of the projects that we have been working on locally. We have growth hubs in our college. It is an ambition of our Skills and Post-16 Education Bill work with the Department for Education that we bring businesses into our further education colleges. We are already doing that through the work of the LEP, including by providing net zero advice and supporting businesses. I have some fantastic local businesses in my area, such as The Boys Who Sew, which have valued the advice and support. We have a huge bid request in to host the world’s first fusion power station in my patch, which has involved every single aspect of local enterprise; a LEP is certainly a big part and player in that. The GFirst LEP chairs in the western gateway area are all members on the gateway board, so we work closely together.

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