Sunak celebrates Tees Valley mayoral election win with Lord Ben Houchen

Well, good to see you all here. Thanks very much for coming. Obviously, the election today, absolutely fantastic. I am just so, so relieved, humbled, proud to get a third term as the Tees Valley mayor as a place where I’ve born, grown up, lived all my life, have such fantastic friends and family. And again, just really proud to be able to continue with the progress that we’ve made over the last seven years. Right. The plan is still underway. There’s still a lot more to do. There’s still a lot more progress that needs to be done, but to get four more years to implement that plan I think is absolutely wonderful. I’m just hope to be able to make as much progress as we have over the first seven years. But there’s a huge weight of responsibility that comes with that as well. You know, the fact that we’ve got the backing of people right across the region when people thought that we weren’t going to win, you know, we’ve had the Labour Party camped here for the last two weeks. The whole Shadow Cabinet have basically funded the tourism industry in Teesside for the last two weeks because they thought they were gonna win it, right? They thought they were gonna have it, but they were nowhere near in the end. And I just want to say thank you so much to everybody that backed me across this region. This is a vote for you. This is a vote for Teesside, Danton and Hartlepool and I absolutely promised to repay you. But at the same time, it’s also about this man next to me, because I could not have delivered the things that we’ve delivered in this region without you, Prime Minister, whether it’s the Freeport in Redka, whether it’s bringing the Treasury and the Darton Economic Campus now to Darlington, creating hundreds and hundreds of jobs. Going to be 2000 in a couple of years, 9000 jobs created on the Freeport employment, up 5.4% since I was elected in 2017. Teesside wouldn’t have had those things if it wasn’t for the contribution that you’ve made, Prime Minister. So thank you very much for everything that you’ve done as well, at least to four more years. It’s for more years. Well, Ben, thank you. Good afternoon, everybody. It’s absolutely great to be here with your re elected mayor of Teesside. And as and as and as Ben said, the Labour Party threw absolutely everything at this election. Keir Starmer came here twice. Rachel Reeves came here three times. But even they couldn’t dislodge Ben and the fantastic Conservative team, right? And they also threw a lot of mud. It needs to be said in this election because they were angry, angry that Ben has delivered more for this region in seven years than Labour Party managed in 30 years, Right. And actually, you know, look where we’re standing. You know, when Ben came into the office, this airport was going to be closed down, right? And now more flights to more places than ever before. The steelworks desolate now part of the one of the most exciting regeneration projects anywhere in the world. And you and I, we work together on some great things. Make sure that the Treasury is in Darlington putting this region at the heart of government. The Freeport as you said the largest in Europe, attracting thousands of jobs and investment to the area. But that is levelling up in action. That is what you get with Ben taking bold decisions for this region. That is the Conservatives delivering. And and I’ve got a message for the Labour Party too, because they know that they had to win here in order to win a general election. They know that they assumed that Tees Valley would just stroll back to them. But it didn’t. It didn’t. People knew that they couldn’t be taken for granted. They knew that it was Ben and the Conservatives that delivered for them. And they stuck with you in this election. And I know that come the general election, they’re going to stick with us too, because they don’t wanna be taken for granted. And they know that it’s you and it’s the Conservatives that are building a brighter future for Teesside and a brighter future for Britain. Congratulations. Thank you. Thanks for all your help. Alright. Hello. Hi, Hannah.