Secretary of State struck by united ‘passion and determination’ in NW

Speaking just prior to the announcement this week that the UK government’s £105m package of support for Derry & Strabane will be matched with an additional £105m by the NI Executive, Mr Lewis said he has been in discussions over recent days with regards to progressing a decision on Derry’s Medical School.

In an interview over Zoom with the Derry Journal, the Secretary of State said he had been struck by the united voices coming from the north west “to get a good economic outcome for the whole area” when he met with civic leaders at the Guildhall and visited O’Neills in Strabane days after taking up his portfolio back in February.

Recalling that visit, he said: “One of literally my first visits was when I came to the Guildhall in Derry-Londonderry and met with [City Centre Initiative manager and Unity of Purpose representative] Jim Roddy and the team there, and then the Council team. “I had been there before actually when I was in the Cabinet Office working on Brexit I came over and did a cabinet round table over in Derry and a couple of years ago as well, so it wasn’t my first visit when I came as Secretary of State but it’s one I enjoyed doing and actually what was really interesting for me, both at O’Neills and also when I was speaking to people at the Guildhall, when I met with Colum Eastwood and the team and Jim Roddy, was that passion and determination everybody had to be working together to get a good economic outcome for the whole area.

“That was one of the reasons why I was so keen to see the City Deal and Growth Deal implemented and driven through,” he said. “Once we come through COVID there’s some good opportunities there to make sure that that investment is realised.

“I think the Growth Deal is the biggest financial package that we have done in the whole of the UK for any of the City Deals, which is an indication of our determination to ensure that kind of investment.”

medical school

The Conservative MP for Great Yarmouth said he was also “quite keen to see the Medical School come to fruition” in time for the cut off point for BMA requirements by the end of this month.

“I spoke to some of the Executive members last week myself on this and it would be good for everybody if we can get that finalised and agreed so that the University and people locally know and have some certainty about the future.

“This is something that is looking to the future in a really good positive way, and having a Post Grad Medical College there is a really good boost for the area. Hopefully the Executive can get that tied up and done within the BMA requirements in the next few weeks. I know the Executive are very focused on that and are alert to that.

“I will be continuing to take a close interest in seeing that through,” Mr Lewis added.

COVID-19

Speaking about his visit to O’Neills in Strabane, Mr Lewis said: “The visit to O’Neills itself I really, really enjoyed. It’s a fabulous company. The way they have such a vertically integrated approach to producing their product, I have not seen anything like that. I used to be in the food and drink industry way back in wholesale and that kind of vertical integration is quite rare, and is no doubt partly why they have been able to so easily switch in order to produce and support work on COVID with PPE and gowns etc. Because they have got that vertical integration they can start from scratch and literally go out and produce whatever they want to produce.”

NI companies generally, he said, were front and centre when it came to production of PPE and research and development in the battle against coronavirus. He also praised the response of business and communities, and said that some of the business measures taken by the government were in direct response to feedback from businesses here.

“We have got to keep in touch with them to get a really good understanding of what they need so that we can make sure that, where it is appropriate, the UK government understands that and can feed that in, and where appropriate to work with the Executive to make sure we have a joined up approach to delivering, like we did on the ferries and the complete partnership on the airports as we saw last week,” he said.

Mr Lewis was involved in those discussions which led last week to a major £5.7m funding package for City of Derry and Belfast City airports and routes to keep both facilities operating during the coronavirus crisis. He said that the joined up thinking on this between the Treasury, the Department of Transport in the UK and the NI Executive had been vital to keep connectivity going both by air and by sea.

cross-border

In terms of the north west as a cross-border region, Mr Lewis said there was ongoing co-operation on the coronavirus restrictions and safeguarding measures north and south.

He said: “There was a Memorandum of Understanding between Simon Harris and Robin Swan and the CMO [Chief Medical Officer} and they have been working together and sharing information, as we do - medical experts and CMOs have been talking to their colleagues around the world to learn experiences, and obviously a country that we share a border with its natural we would do that.

“At the beginning of the crisis I suggested we pull together a sort of co-op meeting, which we have every couple of weeks.

“We had one last week which I joint-chaired with Simon Coveney with First and Deputy First Ministers and relevant Ministers to just have a chat through so that where there are issues where we have a commonality of approach we have a discussion about that, and equally if there are issues coming into the virus and during lockdown and now particularly as we start to talk about, think about how we go forward and come out of it, having those conversations about what that means, so that wherever logical, probable and possible we have a joined up approach and understand each other’s approaches, and share information.

“And occasionally if we do have a different approach, if we know what that is and understand it, we can communicate it properly for people who live and work across and back and forward.”