York and North Yorkshire mayor planning for long-term regional revival

The Mayor of York and North Yorkshire, David Skaith, said he welcomes the stability the Labour Government has brought, adding it will help his combined authority execute its plan for the region over the next 10 years.

Skaith, who will speak at the TheBusinessDesk.com’s Business of Yorkshire Conference on 28 November, has been in office for more than six months, after successfully standing for Labour in the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority mayoral election in early May.

His own background is as a small business owner – he has owned a clothing shop in York for at least a decade – and he said his decision to stand for mayor originally grew out of his frustration with the political system.

“My wife is a teacher, my brother is a police officer and my mum was on an NHS waiting list for three years,” he said.

“There’s been a huge lack of investment into our frontline services and I could tell that a lot of things were in bad shape. I thought I could either just complain, or try to do something about it.

“I put myself forward as a Labour candidate, but this is an area where traditionally Labour hasn’t had a strong voice. It didn’t lend itself to an obvious Labour win.

“But we do have three well established Labour MPs in our region who have the ear of Government.

“Keir Starmer, Rachel Reeves and Angela Rayner invited us down to London within four days of the General Election and last week we had representatives from six Government departments up here on the same day.

“We are being heard and it’s great to have this level of engagement. The Government is keen for us to work with our private sector partners and for us to being the public and private sectors together.

“As a new combined authority we’re doing a lot of engagement with the public to highlight what we’re doing.

“We want to show people that devolution works everywhere – not just in city centres. What we bring is a big strategic overview and we know the Government wants to use mayoral authorities as their delivery arms.”

He compared being mayor to running a business, stressing the importance of bringing in the right team of people and working with stakeholders.

Skaith highlighted the recent creation of the combined authority’s Business Board. It has recruited 13 volunteers from a pool of 120 applicants to reflect the diversity across York and North Yorkshire. They will provide knowledge and experience from across the region’s growth and core economic sectors.

Skaith said the board would help the combined authority develop its plans, hold it to account if necessary and offer a rapid channel of communication.

He added: “Where businesses have a shortage of particular skills, if the colleges are sat around the same table as those businesses they will get that information straight away and will know what they should be gearing their courses towards.”

Outlining some of the authority’s priorities for economic growth, he pointed to the food and farming industries which he noted relate strongly to both the city of York and the large rural parts of the county.

Turning to transport, he said: “Buses are central to developing a transport plan which works for us and we are looking at going for a full franchise model for our bus services.

“Rural connectivity is key and rail is a big factor. At the moment Scarborough – York is an hourly train service and we want to make that every half hour.”

Addressing the authority’s early achievements in its first six months, Skaith highlighted the creation of a high streets fund worth up to £10m.

“As a small business owner myself I have seen the decline of the high street,” he said. “We have 28 towns across the region and so many high streets which have the potential to be vibrant but they have been left behind and ignored.

“By creating this fund we are showing that we are here to invest in our high streets and the small businesses that operate there. It’s something I ran on as a mayoral candidate and something I’m really passionate about.”