THE North-East should wholeheartedly welcome Newcastle and Gateshead's combined bid to become the European Capital of Culture in 2008.

There may be some scepticism about the fantastic-sounding benefits that a successful bid will bring to the North-East: £3bn of investment in transport, leisure and regeneration; millions of new visitors pouring £700m into the region's pockets; 17,000 new jobs.

But the bookmakers aren't sceptical, making Newcastle and Gateshead the 3-1 favourite to win the title.

And it should be remembered that the announcement that Gateshead was to build the Angel of the North was greeted with great scepticism which verged on derision. But the Angel of the North is now indisputably established as one of the country's great landmarks, and even its critics must acknowledge that it has a strange beauty about it.

These things can happen. They can work.

Newcastle has much to recommend it. It has splendid architecture surrounded by a city centre that has been transformed in the last decade. The Blinking Eye Millennium Bridge is a delight and new attractions like the Centre for Life have proved successful. Even the Telewest Arena, which isn't the most high-brow of cultural venues, has proven a boon to the people of the North-East.

The bid's plan to create a new Romans Alive visitor centre, bringing together "the largest and most significant collection of Roman artefacts in the world" and linking in with Hadrian's Wall, sounds particularly exciting. It also shows how the bid is not centred on the narrow boundaries of Newcastle and Gateshead but has big regional implications, and it may also show some other parts of the region how to make the most of their historical heritage too.

However, the fantastically huge monetary benefits of the bid might be outweighed by intangible benefits.

Last week, we saw the launch of One NorthEast's Here.Now. campaign to remind the region that it isn't a bad place to live and work. The next stage of the campaign is to promote the North-East in other parts of the country.

Some see Here.Now. as expensive - it costs £2m - and rather patronising.

Its message, though, is important and positive.

The Capital of Culture bid carries the same message. It says the North-East is not backward and deprived, as the traditional cloth cap image would have it. It says the North-East is an intelligent, thriving place to be.

Even if Newcastle and Gateshead don't win, they will have done the North-East an immense favour just by entering.