People's Republic of Teesside

The news that 230 jos are going at Boulby Potash is devastating for East Cleveland.  Although the news was anticipated by many as the potash reserves became increasingly depleted, its real impact will be felt further around Teesside in terms of the jobs in the extended supply chain  - from engineering to rail freight operation and the potash terminal at Teesport.

Our new temporary MP is trying to be seen to be something - anything - but his first response as seen in the Gazette was to whinge that he was only told by the mine management alongside everyone else.

Occasionally, we feature some columns written by the enigmatic “Hollie Bush” in the East Cleveland newspaper, Coastal View.   Here’s one from last year.

A piece from last week's Northern Echo on the Bleak Future for Social care in our region

A transformation – but for the better?

CRADLE TO GRAVE: The future of social care is also being looked at by the new STPs.

Peter Reiman's iconic photograph of Thatcher on Teesdale is the centre-piece of a superb new exhibition at MIMA which focuses on Thatcherism, Teesside and the 1980s.  It's certainly the most political exhibition I've seen at MIMA in its 10 year history, and is also a welcome reminder of how far MIMA has travelled since founding director Godfrey Worsdale talked of its "civilising" mission back in the mid-2000s.

It's been just over a month since that wonderful night in early June when the sky caved in for Theresa May, the Conservative Party, the tabloids, the Westminster commentariat, opinion pollsters, political scientists, and some of the more embittered elements of the Labour party.  How sweet it is for comrades on the left that this time it was our turn to shake the political establishment to its core.

Just to show the PRT is not dead, but has been merely napping, here a piece from the Stumbling and Mumbling Blog which deserves wider circulation.  That blog hows that there is still backing for the left from unlikely sources (its writer is an economist working on the Investors Chronicle )    This one looks at the wider fall out from Grenfell Tower.