Yes, Paul, an empty promise.
But the DfT have received a general overview of what regeneration in Dover means, with specific examples given of what the reality is here, I made sure of that in my last representation earlier this year.
I didn't even go into mentioning what Deal might need, or Sandwich. Just a look at Dover tells us what kind of costs would be connected to regeneration.
What DHB offer is a one-off payment, followed by annual peanut-dividends. DPPT doesn't offer anything more than that either.
After that, the ferry companies would no doubt be constantly reminded of the Port's debt, and how it needs to be repaid, and I strongly doubt DPPT would have a guarantor should repayments miss out.
Do you all know what happened to Sea France, which borrowed money, and then couldn't pay it back?
Starting up on a massive debt is just a repetition of old 1980s policies that repeat what the Treasury UK did, selling bonds and building up an enormous public debt.
Is this what Localism was all about? Needless to say, the Localism idea doesn't come into either DPPT's project nor that of DHB.
Charlie had campaigned prior to May 2010 that the Port remain a State asset, then he changed 180 degrees and went all out for a Port-sale project, and adding to that, they're claiming it will also regenerate the local District!!!
I've already tested this "tested project" on a spread-sheet as learnt at Pitman Training, and the result was that after a few years, Neil was asking the Gov. for a Port Toll to alleviate the loan.:
That's what my spread sheet showed me after all information was fed in.
That's how it would end up!
There is no way you can borrow such sums of money for a Port, and then expect to have the money to "regenerate a District".
If DPPT is supposed to represent the Community and be a public enterprise, then we could look forward to having a massive public debt here in the... erm... District! (or perhaps just Dover)
If the loan were to be £200 million, for a "community project" in a town of 30,000 people, that would be like a loan of £400 billion to all of Britain, counting 60 million people. If the loan were £400 million, that would be like Britain getting a public debt of £800 billion, all in one fail swoop!
Our total National Debt as of date is £1 trillion, which is 1,000 billion. So we'd be almost there.
Dover's Port could never repay the loan, be it £200 million or £400 million, let alone regenerate Dover and ... gosh! the whole DISTRICT!!!
Surely Dover District's 99% who haven't joined DPPT have realised this!