Southport Town Deal: ‘Now’s the time to roll up our sleeves and make these projects happen’

Southport Town Deal board members are delighted at securing £38.5million in Government investment for our town – now they are “rolling their sleeves up” to ensure that the funding gets to work as soon as possible. 

Chair Rob Fletcher said he was overjoyed to see Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak announce the substantial sum for Southport as well as 43 other towns and cities in his Budget. 

The funding will create 2,000 new jobs directly as well as attracting many more through further private investors. 

Southport’s £37.5million which was announced in the Budget – in addition to £1million of Acceleration Grant funding which was secured last year – was the joint most awarded to any of the Town Deal recipients, along with Stevenage, something Mr Fletcher believes was down to the quality of Southport’s team, the quality of the projects which they submitted and the huge support from local people.  

He said: “This was a massive team effort from everyone involved, both on the board and from local Southport residents. We put together a very impressive bid.

“We are delighted. We are very grateful for the support we have had from people in our town for the input which they put into this.

“The force of that conversation gave us a lot of impetus with the Government.” 

Stand Up For Southport, Turleys and DS Emotion were all involved in carrying out consultation for the Southport Town Deal last year, after the Covid pandemic struck and the UK went into lockdown. Thousands of local people, local businesses and other organisations were eager to share their views on what they thought of Southport and how they wanted to see it change and improve.

More than 7,000 responses were collated, one of the highest response rates in the country. This feedback then shaped the projects which were subsequently submitted to the Government. 

Rob Fletcher, a proud local resident who is Chair of Fletchers solicitors in Southport, said: “The Southport Town Deal consultation was the biggest conversation that has ever been held about our town. 

“It was a really strong part of our submission and backed up the proposals that we put forward. 

“The Government endorsed every single project that we submitted.” 

Southport can look forward to some exciting changes ahead – with much work already taking place. 

Last year, to help communities to build back better from the Covid-19 pandemic, the Government released £1million in Acceleration Grant Town Deal funding to Southport so that some work could begin immediately. 

£100,000 of that went towards supporting the Southport BID scheme to provide new lighting along both sides of the historic Lord Street, creating “a boulevard of lights” that has already attracted huge attention both regionally and nationally.

Speaking in Parliament on 10 March, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “I am told that the boulevard of light on Lord Street rivals the Champs-Élysées itself.” 

Rob Fletcher said: “I think the new lights along Lord Street are absolutely fantastic. 

“Let’s get out of this lockdown and get Lord Street busy again!” 

An artist’s impression of how the new Southport Market would look

The remaining £900,000 of the funding is going towards the transformation of Southport Market into an exciting new food, drink and events venue which is due to open this Spring. 

Other projects include: 

• A new Southport theatre, events and conference centre 
• Spectacular new light show in the Marine Lake 
• Infrastructure to support Southport Pleasureland to become a year-round attraction 
• Creation of new co-working and business incubator space 
• Public realm improvements in Southport town centre

The hard work starts now. Over the next 12 months the Town Deal board has the task of drawing up outline and then full Business Cases for all of their projects before they can then progress them to the planning stage. 

Rob Fletcher said: “We are now at the end of the beginning. 

“We have done the fun part. Now it’s time to roll up our sleeves and get on with making all of this happen. All of the tough detailed work starts now. 

“It is a great opportunity for our town. 

“If we had put forward 25 schemes of £2million each, we would have had no chance. 

“The Government wanted to see a bigger vision that was much grander, and we have achieved that.”

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