Minister agrees to Laura’s call for meeting with Seaside Town MPs

Minister agrees to Laura’s call for meeting with Seaside Town MPs
In Parliament this week, Laura Sandys MP for South Thanet and Sandwich, requested that the Minister of State at the Business, Innovation and Skills Department meet with MPs representing seaside towns.
“I want to ensure that Ministers across all departments understand the particularly characteristics of, and challenges facing seaside towns.
“While our constituencies might be only a few miles from quite prosperous parts of the country, many of our seaside towns face very different challenges and often have a much lower standard of living than the average in England. We frequently have much higher levels of deprivation, incapacity benefit and joblessness. In some instances we also have a high proportion of jobs in the public sector. I will be calling for a cross departmental task force to ensure that our particular challenges are addressed and understood with a particular focus on job creation and support for small business start ups.
“We need to re-balance our economy – and this is particularly important in our most deprived coastal towns. Thanet for example has a huge opportunity to benefit from small sector tourism businesses, jobs in the green economy and small start ups”, said Laura. “I want to ensure that our voice is heard and that our interests are served and very much welcomed the Ministers enthusiasm to meet with us”.
Question raised in the House of Commons – Thursday 8th July
Laura Sandys (South Thanet) (Con): Will the Secretary of State meet a group of seaside MPs whose constituencies face very specific challenges both in job creation and in new business start-ups? Could we further discuss how to boost domestic tourism, which plays such an important part in the economy of my South Thanet constituency?
Mr Prisk: The hon. Lady, if I may say so, is a very good advocate-possibly even a champion-of tourism and so forth. I would be more than happy to meet my hon. Friend and her colleagues. It is important to recognise some of the special problems in particular locations, and start-ups are crucial in that respect.