Rachel Reeves spent TWO days working from Darlington in 2025

The Northern Echo can reveal that Ms Reeves only worked from the town’s Treasury offices on two occasions in 2025.

She said she wanted to use the town’s Treasury offices “regularly” during a visit to the site after her election in July 2024, and even urged fellow ministers to do the same.

But in March last year the Echo revealed she had worked there only twice between in her first six months in office.

And now it has been confirmed she visited just twice in 2025, meaning the frequency of her visits has actually decreased.

The Chancellor has been criticised by the town’s Tory politicians including former MP Peter Gibson who says her record speaks to Labour having a “disregard for Darlington”.

Details of Reeves’ visits were obtained through a Freedom of Information request.

Speaking on the site of the Treasury’s new hub on Brunswick Street on Friday, Ms Reeves reaffirmed her commitment to the town – but didn’t go into details on whether she planned to work from Darlington more often.

“I am not just committed to it, but want to grow it. At the moment, I think there are around 1,000 people working in the DEC building”, she told the Echo.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves at the new Darlington Economic Campus site in Darlington (Image: Ian Forsyth/PA Wire)

“This [new] building will hopefully be up by the end of next year, and we’ll have capacity for around 1,600 people.


“We’re building three hubs of this sort in the north of England, and we chose Darlington as one of those three – the others in York and Manchester.

“Not only am I committed to it, I want to see it grow, and I want to see a higher proportion of civil servants based in the north of England.”

But when asked whether she was planning to work from Darlington more this year, Ms Reeves responded: “I’m not going to give a number because then you’re just sort of chasing an arbitrary number. 

“But anyone that looks at my diary can see that I spend plenty of time in the north of England, not just in buildings, but actually out and about with people.”

‘I spend plenty of time in the North’

Ms Reeves previously branded the Darlington Treasury site as a “real success story” and said it was “incredibly important” to the Labour government.

Last March this newspaper’s reporting that the Chancellor spent just two days at the site in six months sparked concerns over her commitment to the town.

These same concerns have now resurfaced after the revelation she spent only two days here in the following 12 months, with Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen saying that if Labour is serious about “turning things around” then the Chancellor should “get out of Whitehall and come to Darlington”.

The Darlington Economic Campus (Image: Stuart Boulton)

Former Darlington MP Peter Gibson added the Chancellor “does not pay the DEC the attention it deserves” while Conservative leader Jonathan Dulston said it outlined “no real ambition to move power out of Whitehall”. 

But Ms Reeves, who spent Friday being toured around the Brunswick Street site and the Darlington Hippodrome, argued she spends a lot of her time in the North East.

She said: “I’m a Northern MP. I’m an MP in Leeds and after being here today, I’ll be going back to my constituency. I have got close family up here.

“I think that people would be pretty hard-pressed to say that I’m not in touch with what’s happening in the north of England. 


The new Darlington Economic Campus site in Darlington (Image: Ian Forsyth/PA Wire)

“The biggest announcement of this government, in terms of capital investment is probably going to be the announcement we made on Wednesday about Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) and those services will come to Darlington, to Durham, and to Newcastle, as well.”

Breaking new ground

The Treasury’s move to Darlington, first announced by the Conservative Party in 2021, has long been touted as a project showing true ‘levelling up’ in action. 

Rachel Reeves breaking ground at the new campus (Image: Ian Forsyth/PA Wire)

It was seen as a landmark moment for the previous government for making central government decisions in the North, with departments first moving into the Feethams DEC site in June 2022. 

There are currently 1,925 civil service roles based in Darlington across ten major Government departments in the town. 

The new Brunswick Street site will be home to more than 1,600 civil servants when it opens, which is expected to be in the first quarter of 2028. 

Built on the site of a former car park next to the Darlington East End club and opposite St Cuthbert’s church, the building will form part of the wider DEC, which consists of Feethams House and Bishopsgate House.