Some months ago a group of Tees Valley residents formed the #Resistance. They were enraged at Mayor Houchen cancelling a public-access board meeting just after the Gove Review of Tees Valley had recommended greater transparency.
And so the hashtag #BinBen was born, together with a logo, merchandise like T-shirts, mugs and hoodies, and a series of Twitter storms.
Yesterday was Ben’s revenge. At 5.30pm sharp, workers on Teesworks were ordered to assemble for a group photograph surrounded by posters with the #BinBen logo – except they read #BackBen. The staff said “cheese” under threat of losing their jobs.
The new hashtag festooned site machinery. A simple task as the picture was organised by Chester Corney. He’s the son of Martin Corney who is a private partner in Teesworks Ltd.
Chester is co-director in the plant hire company TCC Plant which leases machinery to contractors on the Teesworks site. The company’s equity in 2023 stood at £6.8mn.
Chester is also co-owner with Corney’s son- in-law Tom Carr of TCC Metals Ltd which was incorporated in October last year. They already have a scrap deal with British Steel, according to Private Eye.
Daddy Martin Corney has a big share in the whopping £108mn already earned by the four Teesworks Ltd private partners, who have paid nothing for their 90% stake in the joint venture or for the clean-up of this toxic site.
So it’s no surprise that the Corneys are giving gung-ho backing to Houchen’s campaign.
Houchen has posted a protest on Facebook. No, the staff were assembled at 4pm and allowed to go home early, he said. No, the trucks were owned by ZTL, he said.
And so we have a shiny-ball diversion the day before the mayoral election. A skilful move after the Commons Business and Trade Committee has requested a National Audit Office investigation into the use of public funds at Teesside Freeport, of which the Teesworks site is the hub.
