Local News

The development of a world-first multi-billion pound energy project on Teesside has been welcomed by local MP's;

The first shop to be supported by the council's High Street Support Scheme has opened in Loftus;

...and Universal Credit has now been fully rolled out in job centres around Redcar and Cleveland.

The development of a world-first multi-billion pound energy project on Teesside has been welcomed by local MP's.

A consortium of six global energy giants have today unveiled phase one of their plans to create a huge power plant on Teesside which will run on natural clean gas.

Branded the ‘Clean Gas Project’, it will be the world’s first gas-powered energy plant to deploy Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) at scale.

It means that CO2 from the plant will be captured and then stored via pipelines under the North Sea.

The infrastructure created will also enable wider industry on Teesside and elsewhere to capture and store CO2 from their processes.

The first shop to be supported by the council's High Street Support Scheme has opened in Loftus.

Following assistance from Redcar & Cleveland Borough Council's £2 million High Street Support Scheme, a new children's soft play centre and café has opened in a long-term vacant unit.

The scheme provides grant funding to improve shop or business units in Eston, Loftus, Guisborough, Saltburn and Redcar town centres.

One of the first businesses to benefit is Oopsie Daisy's – a soft play area for under 5s and café on Loftus High Street.

The building, which had been empty for two years, required a complete overhaul including new electrics and plumbing, damp treatment  and installation of a disabled toilet, a  staircase and a new floor.

Universal Credit has now been fully rolled out in job centres around Redcar and Cleveland.

It means that the controversial benefit reform has now been implemented across Teesside, after the full roll out saw all claimants move over to the new system in Middlesbrough and Stockton earlier this year.

The Department for Work and Pensions went ahead, despite Redcar and Cleveland Council writing to the then secretary of state for work and pensions, Esther McVey, asking for it to be delayed due to fears families would be left penniless over Christmas due to a five week delay in processing initial payments.

Council leader Sue Jeffrey insisted the authority would be working hard to support those claimants moving over to Universal Credit - the new, single benefit which replaces six other benefits, and is paid monthly.