Once every three or four months, all Worcestershire MPs get together with the County Council and the Local Enterprise Partnership. It is a great opportunity to discuss county wide issues and to make sure the county as a whole remains strong. After all, Wyre Forest can only perform well if the whole county and, indeed, the region is doing well.
Topics discussed cover things such as health and social care, roads and rail infrastructure, broadband, schools, a report on the state of the council and a wider look at areas that are in the news, such as that of child sexual exploitation.
The good news is that Wyre Forest is doing relatively well. We have investment coming into the railway station in Kidderminster, providing a fit for purpose transport hub that includes busses as well as trains. We have money coming into the Hoobrook Link Road – a road that will not only open up the former sugar beet site, but also relieve congestion around both the south of Kidderminster and Stourport. Superfast broadband is arriving in Wyre Forest faster than the rest of the county, with delivered and soon to be delivered superfast broadband being the second highest in the county (closely behind Worcester city).
The focus of our education discussion was looking at moving from a three tier to a two tier system in other parts of the county. Readers will remember the huge debate we had here in Wyre Forest when we changed – a four year debate, followed by a £125 million investment in schools, decided in 2005. For a short spell, educational outcomes fell in Wyre Forest whilst the disruption of the changes took their toll, but since then standards have risen dramatically, proving the decision was ultimately the right one.
One of the areas of concern was health, where the ongoing exploration of reconfiguration of acute services still fails to reach a conclusion. Readers will know that I am proud of the work of the cross-party Kidderminster Hospital Alliance and how it has kept together for the benefit of local residents, putting local interests above that of party politics. History has proved that this is the best way forward.
But the wider county and all the issues that are important to it, is doing well. It takes time and effort to get these things right and we are beginning to reap the benefits.