Nick being interviewed by students from Sacred Heart School as part of the Media Experience Programme

On Friday Nick attended the launch of Media Experience, a new project run at the Chronicle offices in central Newcastle. The scheme aims to give school groups from around the North East a hands-on guide to life in the media industry. It has a lot to offer in teaching young people about the press, while also helping with numeracy, literacy and IT skills. Nick was interviewed by Newcastle students who were then able to draw up a mock Chronicle front page setting out their scoop.

Nick said: “I am hugely enthusiastic about this project, and I was delighted to be invited along. The media is a very strong and growing industry and this facility will provide a very valuable service.”

Nick Brown met representatives of the company in Downing Street this week. He said “It was a good meeting and I set out the case for our site. It is very strong. It is the sort of work that people want to do.

“They would get a good workforce and the site is ideal as it is next to the railway line and the A1.”

Full story in the Journal here.

Nick said: “The average weekly amount of Pension Credit paid to eligible pensioners in Newcastle is worth £48.25 per week. We know there could be as many as 110,000 North East Pensioners who although entitled to this money are currently not receiving it. We therefore need a good take up campaign to get pensioners the money that is rightfully theirs.

“The Government has taken targeted action to support families, businesses and jobs through the current downturn.  Pension Credit is just one of the ways that is being done. There is entitlement to working tax credit and family tax credit as well.

“Tuesday’s visit to Tyneside by Angela Eagle, the Minister for Pensions highlighted the work that the Government is doing to publicise entitlement and provide checks to ensure that where there is an entitlement, people get the real help, available now. But we need to do more.

“I can announce today that together with professional advisers from the Department for Work and Pensions I will be organising, over the summer recess, mobile advice centres, estate by estate, in my constituency to make sure that I do everything I can to make sure that every constituent gets their full entitlement.

“I am delighted that the Evening Chronicle has agreed to support and join with me in promoting this take up campaign, which complements the good work they have already done on their own Crunchbuster campaign. It is going to be a busy summer.”

“I am really inspired by what I have seen this afternoon. I do feel the North- East could become a world leader in the electric vehicle market.

“We should embrace it. There are plans for recharging points right across the region. We could roll it out quickly and there is support and interest from the local authorities.”

Full story in the Northern Echo here.

Nick Brown said the head of the British Library had met with himself and other MPs yesterday where the two sides had “agreed to differ” over the calls for the book to be returned to the region where it was written and illustrated some 1,300 years ago.

Nick said attempts to hide behind a need to preserve the national collection were “missing the point”. He said: “I think they need to remember the North East is part of the UK and we would like a little bit of that national collection in our region. We are only asking for one book to come home and be looked after in Durham. It is sensible for us to keep talking to the British Library and see if we can find a way forward.”

Full story on the Journal here.

Nick Brown, the Government Chief Whip and Minister for the North-East, replied: “I will do everything I can to make sure we don’t go back to mass unemployment. Windpower is the only renewable energy source that you can easily get to market. There’s a very good claim for it to be offshore because everybody agrees with it, but nobody wants it next to their house.”

He predicted “the greatest change in the employment base since the decline of shipbuilding” would occur on the north bank of the Tyne where there are plans for a turbine building industry.

“Jobs will be in their thousands and they will endure not just for one generation but two and beyond, as then advances in wavepower will be developed.”

Full article can be found here.

A planning application to build a wind turbine manufacturing plant at the former Neptune shipyard, in Walker, was today being lodged with Newcastle city council. The factory will create an initial 500 jobs, with thousands more to follow when it kicks into action.

Nick Brown said: “This is the birth of a new industry on the Tyne. The Governments policy on tackling climate change is clear. We need to diversify our energy generation from carbon to renewable technologies like wind.”

Further details in today’s Chronicle here.

THE prospect of a high-speed rail link to the North East took a major step forward last night when a senior Government minister promised to meet train bosses and prepare a detailed business case.

Minister for the North East Nick Brown will work with the head of National Express East Coast to estimate the cost of a route from London to Newcastle.

Mr Brown, who is also Chief Whip, said: “I do not want us to miss what could be a very important aspect of the rail debate for us. I will talk to Susan Goldsmith first, then take that to regional agencies.

“We have to know what we can reasonably ask for, because I can’t go to the Department of Transport with a generalised wish list and a £1bn price tag.”

“The effects of the tax are fairly different in parts of London compared to the North East. It is a regional case I have made as the Regional Minister.”

Full story in the Journal here.