Government Business

NEW RELEASE:
GOVERNMENT BUSINESS 25.06

Has Brexit confusion left the North behind?

As we go to press, Theresa May has just faced and overcome a vote of confidence in her leadership, with the Prime Minister warning that a new leader would see a delay to Brexit preparations.

However, with May’s reolute face splashed across the front pages following her decision to delay the Brexit vote in the Commons, it becomes too easy to place all of our attention on the chaos encompassing Westminster.

At the start of the month, the IPPR North thinktank revealed that spending in the north of England has fallen by £6.3 billion since 2010, while spending in the south-east and south-west of England has increased by £3.2 billion over the same period. It has been a while since the north-south divide has led conversation, but such financial disparity should not be ignored.

With northern leaders such as Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham stressing that it is within the national interest for the north to thrive, and therefore it should be at the front of the queue for public investment, it was with a sense of sadness that I read of Liverpool Mayor Joe Anderson stepping down from his involvement in the Northern Powerhouse Partnership.

Anderson said how the partnership was ‘set up by a government which isn’t prepared to listen’. At present, nobody can be particularly clear of what the government is prepared to do, but, with May at the helm or not, Brexit must refrain from being a London-based conversation.

Michael Lyons, editor