Yorkshire’s economic potential is being wasted, the only way to fix this is to give local communities control - Rachel Reeves

Across Yorkshire and the Humber, households will see their mortgages go up by an estimated £1,800, with prices rising by £1,890 a year for families in Dewsbury, to £1,810 in Scarborough and Whitby, and £1,700 a year for households in my constituency of Leeds West.

The reality of this isn’t just people having to cut back on essentials – it means completely upending household finances and creating huge anxiety around what should be a safe anchor.

Interest rates and inflation are up in many countries – but here in the UK families are hit so much harder and personally because our economy is so weak after 13 years of Tory economic mismanagement.

And after the Tories crashed the economy in September, working people again paid the price for their failure, landed with a mortgage penalty for years to come. This isn’t just bad for family finances, it’s weighing on our economy too.

Despite Britain’s enormous potential for growth – from our amazing businesses to our capacity to lead in the industries of the future – the IMF downgraded our growth this week. The UK is the only major economy forecast to shrink this year, with weaker growth than our competitors for the next two years.

While the world’s growth has been upgraded, Britain’s has been downgraded, with our growth even worse under the Tories than sanctions-hit Russia.

The IMF chief economist singles out our higher mortgage rates as a reason for Britain’s poor performance. To get us out of this difficult situation – we need two things.

First, we need to tackle the cost of living crisis now. As well as the Tory mortgage penalty weighing on households across Yorkshire, this week saw Shell post extraordinary profits – the highest level in 115 years raking in £32.2bn.

These enormous windfalls of war are being recorded while families worry about making ends meet ahead of another big spike in energy bills in April – and expected rise of 40 per cent.

So Labour would be bringing in a proper, one-off windfall tax on energy giants, to stop the energy price cap going up for households in April. It’s right and fair, and it’s what the government should do right now.

Using that money, we’d also provide support for businesses, and end the scandalous penalty paid by people on prepayment meters, while bringing in a three month moratorium on their forced installation.

It has been frightening to hear stories this week of undercover investigations revealing companies forcing prepayment installation on vulnerable people – including a young mother with a four week old baby.

And Labour are also calling for the government to rule out another rise in fuel duty at the upcoming Budget if OBR predictions deem it affordable.

These immediate measures would ease the headache for families and stop bills going up now – but the second key thing we need is a plan to keep bills down in the future too – so we don’t have to keep lurching from sticking plaster to sticking plaster.

That’s what Labour’s long-term plan to deliver Clean Power by 2030, and our nationwide home insulation programme will do.

As well as creating good jobs, economic growth and energy security, it could save families up to £1,400 on their bills, not just now, but every year in the future too.

It will give us the stability we need, and help us build a future where we can thrive – not just survive.

Unfortunately, survival seems to be the only mode our current government has – and it’s seen nowhere more starkly than in the Hunger Games style competition for levelling up funding that left so many communities behind this month.

In the Government’s latest round of levelling up funding, as The Yorkshire Post reported, our county lost out on more money than any other region in the UK – with only 13 per cent of bids and funding accepted by the Government.

I am so excited by the potential our local economies across Yorkshire and the Humber have – but it seems the government barely believes in them.

Yorkshire has so much innovation to be proud of, but the government fails to recognise it.

Alongside our Leeds West Councillors, I worked on a bid which sought to regenerate Armley Town Street, with vast improvements to five parks across the constituency. However, this ended up just another bid in Yorkshire turned down with no clear reason as to why.

The only way to fix this is to hand power back to our local communities. Labour’s Take Back Control Act will hand powers for local leaders to deliver the levelling up they want to see - be it skills in Leeds, housing in Bradford, or culture in Sheffield.

This will let local people make the big calls about what affects them, and not leave it to decision-makers in Whitehall.

Levelling up should not be a fight, it should be a collaboration between regions to transform our economy.

Our local economies have the talent and the ideas, but we need to give them the tools to create the jobs and the opportunities here.

Rachel Reeves is Shadow Chancellor and Leeds West MP.