Andy Burnham must think local, but act globally

Just over 20 years ago, I called for the House of Lords – half of Parliament – ​​to be moved to Manchester. I did this for the same reason that Andy Burnham wants to do the Prime Minister’s job partly from this great northern city: because our national politics are too concentrated in London. It didn’t take a genius, then or now, to see that the combination of Northern deindustrialization and Southern decision-making was becoming toxic.

The populist forces that gave us Brexit speak cynically of the “London metropolitan elite”, because their past and present leaders – foremost among them Nigel Farage, Richard Tice and Boris Johnson – are very much part of that elite. Andy Burnham, on the other hand, is a northerner who attended public school (although he also graduated from Cambridge). He has built a unique political career in London and Manchester, and is now looking to turn it into a Labor government project aimed at boosting growth and defeating the populists.

Burnham’s leadership launch speech in Manchester on Monday therefore focused on local politics. Its slogan is “place first, not party first”.

On one level this is also self-serving, in that he actually wants to “put first, particularly the poorest places in north London, so that Labor becomes the number one party in the next election”. However, as a mainstream government project, it rests on the glaring reality that deindustrialization since the 1980s has chronically disfigured most of England and Wales beyond London and the South East. These regions have thrived on the continued growth of the financial services and business sectors, while other regions have suffered severely from the decline of older manufacturing – and in some cases mining – industries that were never properly replaced.

So the big question is: Will “place first, not party first” generate a plan for the North and other declining parts of the country that could actually improve their fortunes?

Unsurprisingly, as outgoing mayor of Greater Manchester, Burnham places greater devolution at the heart of the principle “first thing first”. And to decentralization (i.e. the transfer of power to subnational institutions), he proposes to add decentralization (i.e. the exercise of national power in places well beyond London, as in his “Number 10 North” project).

Both decentralization and decentralization have a role to play in regional growth. Manchester’s renaissance owes much to the success of Burnham and the city’s former chief executive, Howard Bernstein, who harnessed planning powers, as well as national and local resources, to attract jobs and build crucial infrastructure. Manchester Metrolink, the UK’s largest light rail system, and the new Bee Network, an integrated bus system, are visible manifestations of this, alongside the city’s skyscrapers.

The irony is that in all these respects Manchester’s success lies essentially in copying London which, as well as being the national capital, has benefited from over a century of strong leaders and mayors who have built infrastructure (notably Transport for London) and redeveloped large areas like Docklands, creating new jobs and attracting industry.

“Place first” should enable other city regions to copy London and Manchester in the same way.

However, national policy is at least as important as local and municipal leadership in generating successful regional growth. The North’s relative decline was exacerbated by decades of national policy that undervalued manufacturing and the tax, investment, education and training systems on which these industries depended.

Sadly, to this list is now added Brexit, which has decimated the UK’s goods export industries while its service industries have been far less badly hit. Trump’s tariffs have had a similarly brutal impact on Britain’s manufacturing industry, including his huge levies on imports of cars, steel and aluminum.

“Place first” must therefore be as active in Brussels and Washington as in Manchester and regional capitals beyond London. A worrying sign is the cancellation of plans for a UK-EU summit, scheduled for July 22, days after Burnham takes office, if he does indeed become party leader. Because nothing is more important for regional growth than the renegotiation of Boris Johnson’s disastrous Brexit deal and his complete withdrawal from the EU’s customs union and single market.

To “rewire Britain”, as he promised this week, Burnham must accelerate Keir Starmer’s EU reset, not delay it.