Reform UK leader Nigel Farage and Reform UK Shadow Chancellor Robert Jenrick met pensioners in Redcar yesterday, pledging to protect their financial security and warning that high energy costs are holding back jobs in the North East.
Farage and Jenrick visited O’Grady’s Hotel, where they joined residents for tea, sandwiches, scones and Reform-branded cupcakes before posing with “Protecting Your Pension” placards.
Farage said the visit was an opportunity to hear directly from pensioners and those approaching retirement amid the debate over the triple lock.
“We have been speaking to pensioners and soon-to-be pensioners just to get their perception on this whole, ‘Oh the old get everything and the young get nothing’ debate - and I do accept that it is tough for young people”, he told The Northern Echo.
Jenrick stressed the importance of protecting older people.
“We need to make sure that we protect older people in the last decades of their lives and give them the financial security that they deserve”, he said.
The discussions also focused on the loss of industrial jobs in an area with a proud history of steelmaking and chemical manufacturing.
Farage challenged claims that green jobs would replace those lost, pointing to nearby wind farms.
“It produces a few jobs, but nothing compared to the jobs that are gone”, he said.
He warned that industrial energy prices, which are eight times those in America and 12 times those in China, were undermining prospects for recovery.
“Unless we get that right, areas like this are not going to see big numbers of good jobs coming back.”
Farage also accused the Conservatives of pretending to have “solutions to problems that they created themselves”, pointing to their decision to write Net Zero into law.
His verdict on the Conservatives’ prospects in Redcar was blunt: “Even though the Tories won here in Redcar in 2019, they’ve got no chance next time.”
Farage and Jenrick visited O’Grady’s Hotel, where they joined residents for tea, sandwiches, scones and Reform-branded cupcakes before posing with “Protecting Your Pension” placards.
Farage said the visit was an opportunity to hear directly from pensioners and those approaching retirement amid the debate over the triple lock.
“We have been speaking to pensioners and soon-to-be pensioners just to get their perception on this whole, ‘Oh the old get everything and the young get nothing’ debate - and I do accept that it is tough for young people”, he told The Northern Echo.
Jenrick stressed the importance of protecting older people.
“We need to make sure that we protect older people in the last decades of their lives and give them the financial security that they deserve”, he said.
The discussions also focused on the loss of industrial jobs in an area with a proud history of steelmaking and chemical manufacturing.
Farage challenged claims that green jobs would replace those lost, pointing to nearby wind farms.
“It produces a few jobs, but nothing compared to the jobs that are gone”, he said.
He warned that industrial energy prices, which are eight times those in America and 12 times those in China, were undermining prospects for recovery.
“Unless we get that right, areas like this are not going to see big numbers of good jobs coming back.”
Farage also accused the Conservatives of pretending to have “solutions to problems that they created themselves”, pointing to their decision to write Net Zero into law.
His verdict on the Conservatives’ prospects in Redcar was blunt: “Even though the Tories won here in Redcar in 2019, they’ve got no chance next time.”
