IS DEVOLUTION DRIVE SLOWING TO A STANDSTILL?

 

 

BACK IN YOUR BOX!

The government’s commitment to devolving power to the North was the subject of sharp disagreement amongst top speakers during the first week of the International Festival of Business in Liverpool.

Lord Heseltine said it was a casualty of Brexit and Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham said he felt the government was putting him “back in the box”. However, the Conservative Mayor of the West Midlands begged to differ. Andy Street told the audience of business people, he didn’t feel that he is being put back in any sort of box and, with the help of the private sector, the Midlands Engine was roaring with 12,000 housing starts and half a billion from the government to clear brownfield sites.

These exchanges came on a day when the Festival had lined up an impressive range of guests to discuss urban policy. Five English mayors joined forces to renew their call to demand greater devolution of powers particularly concerning apprenticeship funds.

The government’s Apprenticeship Levy Scheme is intended to fund new apprenticeships through a levy of 0.5% on the wage bill of large employers. It raises £3bn a year and is meant to pay for apprenticeships. However, over a billion is languishing in Treasury coffers according to Andy Burnham and the most recent figures show apprenticeships dropping!

The main challenge for these mayors is economic improvement, so what have they achieved in their first year. They are often dealing with strategic issues that don’t yield instant results. For instance, Steve Rotheram (Liverpool City Region) said his priorities were ultrafast broadband and the green energy coast around Liverpool Bay. Andy Burnham (Greater Manchester) saw the need for quick “retail” wins like a free bus pass for 16-18-year olds.

There are to be new regional industrial strategies for Greater Manchester and the West Midlands, but not elsewhere apparently. This is evidence of the piecemeal approach being adopted by the government and whilst Sir Howard Bernstein continued to criticise the Regional Development Agency structure at the Downtown Festival conference, the fact remains that it had the advantage of being coherent across the country.

MALE AND PALE.

All English city region mayors are male, and, except for London’s Sadiq Khan who attended the Festival this week, they are all white. So, theatre director Jude Kelly returned to the city of her birth to decry this state of affairs. She uttered a profound truth about the regeneration and devolution debate, that it seems to almost exclusively interest blokes. That is so correct. I attend far more conferences on this subject than is good for me and the absence of woman, and even more, the ethnic communities is so striking.

Kelly said this would only change through education and the use of female role models to inspire young women to take an interest in engineering, regeneration and devolution.

Andy Burnham opined that at least the mayoral model was rid of the petty point scoring of Westminster which he was happy to leave behind.

No time was given by the moderator for the audience to ask any questions, which was unfortunate. I would have asked if the Labour or Conservative Party would consider all women shortlists for the next round of contests in 2020.

There was evidence of international interest in the Festival, particularly from China. It has two more weeks to run which is shorter than previous Festivals, but I picked up a feeling that the next one could be consolidated into one intensive week of high quality events. That said, congratulations are due to Max Steinberg and his team for bringing the world of business to Liverpool.

 

ELECTED MAYORS: FIRST YEAR REPORT

 

THE LOCAL CHAMPIONS.

Last May the city regions of Manchester and Liverpool underwent the biggest change in local government since the Metro counties were abolished over thirty years ago.

Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram were elected to give a voice to these conurbations and were given powers over strategic functions. Whatever criticisms there may be of what they have done so far, they have got on with it while other areas of the north have lacked the desire and vision to bring about similar devolution deals.

As they say at award ceremonies “let’s look at their work.”

ANDY BURNHAM UP FRONT

As a former Cabinet Minister Andy Burnham has grasped the essential point of this elected mayor business. It is to be a visible voice for a big city and nine smaller communities to government.

We saw this in action in the most awful of circumstances soon after Burnham took office. In the early days he spoke for all in saying Greater Manchester was “grieving and strong”, he held the government to their pledge on special funds and crucially set up a review which revealed shortcomings in the organisation of the blue light response to the outrage.

He has been high profile on a range of issues attracting the advice that he should sometimes get off the television screen and get on with the day job.

There are indeed a couple of thorny issues to be addressed that could bring him into conflict with Manchester City Council. The arrival of Mr Burnham has not been met with unalloyed pleasure. The city always has a difficult relationship with bodies it sees as challenging its position like the old Greater Manchester Council and more recently the North West Development Agency.

The first of these issues is the homeless. Burnham has made this one of his highest priorities but there are complaints that his stance on the issue has made the city centre a magnet for desperate people threatening to overwhelm support services.

The other issue is housing policy. There is growing unrest amongst Labour councillors in the city about the amount of luxury flat development and the lack of provision of affordable homes. One of Mayor Burnham’s first acts was to send the conurbation’s spatial planning strategy back to the drawing board calling it “developer driven”. The revised spatial strategy could see Burnham posing as the champion of affordable homes, leaving Manchester Council leader Sir Richard Leese with some uncomfortable questions to answer.

 

GIVE ME TIME: ROTHERAM.

 

Steve Rotheram did not take kindly to a recent article in the Liverpool Echo suggesting he hadn’t done much in his first few months in charge.

He reasonably makes the general point that his post requires him to deal with strategic issues from Southport to Runcorn and changes don’t come quickly. The other thing that needs saying is that he started from scratch and had to deal with an elected mayor in the city of Liverpool who was not in a mood to make life easy for his old friend. Some of those tensions have eased now and Rotheram is using his great personal skills to good effect. Only last week I met up with him in Runcorn at an event championing green energy. Rotheram sees the opportunity for hi tech, well paid jobs for the future in that sector. He is building a business case for a Mersey barrage

He has also unveiled plans for a range of initiatives from cheaper Fast Tags on the Mersey tunnels, a brownfield register for housing and a target of building 25,000 affordable homes.

However, like Burnham, the Liverpool City Region mayor wants more powers but in polls people seem unconvinced that he should have them.

The task of both men in the next year is to start delivering tangible results and convince the government to grant the full devolution powers that elected mayors need to succeed.

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“EDUCATION DEPARTMENT NEEDS A KICKING”.

 

 

EDUCATION MINISTRY HINDRANCE TO SKILLS TRAINING.

As the skills and productivity crisis deepens, the Department for Education has come under savage attack from the mayors of Greater Manchester and the Liverpool City region.

Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram are getting into their stride in speaking for the North on a range of issues as was evidenced at a packed Downtown meeting this week. There wasn’t a single reference to strained relations between the core cities of Liverpool and Manchester, just a demonstration of the easy relationship that the two politicians share. This is important for the northern voice. Oh, that it was replicated in Yorkshire where rival councils are knocking nine bells out of each other over devolution models. Or in Lancashire, Cheshire and Cumbria where to describe progress on devolution as glacial would be to insult those magnificent features of the natural world.

After their election in May both men had very different starts. Burnham acquired a large staff at his Oxford Street headquarters in Manchester, although he said he envied Rotheram’s ability to shape his own team. That was a reference to the “Mary Celeste” situation faced by the Liverpool City Region mayor when he took office. Rotheram inherited no staff and a difficult relationship with Liverpool city mayor Joe Anderson.

Both men were just back from visits to Paris and New York and have realised that they need to impress the world, not just the government, that the North is a great place to invest in.

Raising skill levels is one of their main aims and you’d think the Department for Education would be an ally. Not so apparently. Rotheram said it was the least responsive department in Whitehall and needed a good kicking. The mayors wanted to control skills spending locally and show young people that there are routes to success other than through university by boosting vocational training. Burnham had been to his kid’s Year 9 options meeting where the ICT teacher had no takers while the pupils queued for humanities subjects.

Now in office the mayors want to tone down the politics to appeal to business. They feel firms in the two sub regions would feel more comfortable dealing with them than the highly politically charged Westminster village. They are working with other elected mayors including West Midlands Tory Mayor Andy Street.

Transport is another area where the mayors have given a voice to the North. With Downtown providing the launch pad they had launched a salvo of criticism over the government’s broken promises in the summer. They claimed it had born fruit to some extent with Liverpool City Region getting two “touch points” with HS2 and the Chancellor announcing a £400m cash boost for northern transport at the party conference. All well and good but still small potatoes compared with transport spending in London.

While stressing that their door was open to business, the mayors fired a shot across the bows of house builders saying the emphasis on developers needs had to change to provide the affordable housing that is in short supply. Andy Burnham made a striking remark that may meet with a mixed reception in his outer boroughs. He said they needed to shrink their retail offer and increase the space for housing.

Finally, on Brexit, the mayors had recently met with Brexit Minister David Davis. Burnham had told him that Greater Manchester exported 58% of its exports to the EU compared with the national average of 44%. No deal would be a very bad deal for him. Rotheram, also a Remainer, nevertheless said the port of Liverpool stood ready to welcome global opportunities post Brexit.

It is too early to say whether these politicians will actually deliver their visions, but people can begin to see how City Region mayors might make a difference in the absence of what we really need, which is powerful regional government.

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WHERE IS THE BRITISH MACRON?

 

THE EU STRENGTHENED.

The French people have turned the tide on the 2016 populist surge which led to reckless Brexit and reckless Trump in the White House.

Opponents of the European Union were forecasting it would break up following populist success in Hungary, Holland and France. All three countries have rejected a return to a nationalist Europe with all the potential consequences that could bring. With the UKIP style implosion of the Alternative for Deutschland Party in Germany I predict a victory for Angela Merkel this autumn. Then we will see how strong and stable Mrs May will be when faced with France, Germany and the other 25 European countries insisting that if you are out of a club you must have a worse deal than if you are in.

I saw a report this week on a Shropshire company that makes engine blocks. They must cross 5 European borders in ten days and time is vital. They are desperately worried about how they are going to operate outside the EU. That’s the reality facing business. Let’s hope Jeremy Corbyn’s refusal to rule out staying in the EU wasn’t just another blunder, although the Lib Dems offer the clearest policy on a second referendum.

 

 

BACK IN THE DRIVER’S SEAT.

Geoff Driver is the great survivor of Lancashire politics. After a controversial reign as Chief Executive of Preston Council, he made a successful change to politics leading the Conservatives to victory in the county in 2009. Thrown out of office in 2013, he survived a leadership challenge, police dropped an investigation into him over the One Connect Ltd issue and last Friday I was in County Hall for his return to office.

He faces big challenges to soften the cuts that Labour reluctantly made. Driver insists there will be no sweetheart deals with his government. A final word on this. Jeni Mein, the outgoing Labour leader was one of the most decent hard working politicians I had the pleasure to meet. Good luck to her successor, Nelson councillor Azhar Ali. He will prove a lively opponent for Geoff Driver.

MAYORS.

After snubbing Jeremy Corbin at a victory celebration, Andy Burnham was quickly down to work making two good deputy appointments. Sir Richard Leese is taking on the business portfolio. Does this show Leese is preparing to end his long tenure as leader of Manchester? Anyway, from Burnham’s point of view…..(fill in the tent and urination metaphor here). The other key appointment is Bev Hughes to look after crime and the police. The former Stretford and Urmston MP will be taking over from the ex-Police Commissioner Tony Lloyd who hopes to win the Rochdale seat.

That choice by a panel of Labour’s National Executive has been welcomed by the constituency whereas in Liverpool Walton the choice of a Unite placeman, Daniel Carden, at the expense of Liverpool mayor Joe Anderson has caused outrage. These panels should have the constituency chair as a member and certainly should not have a Unite member as was the case with Walton. But if a party is so dependent on one source of funding, this is what you get.

Joe heading for Westminster was a neat way of solving a

 potential conflict between him and newly elected City

 Region Mayor, Steve Rotheram. We’ll have to see if grown

 up behaviour prevails to the advantage of the city region.

 

GENERAL ELECTION POINTERS.

 

The local elections showed Labour’s fragility in the North

outside its urban heartland. A spectacular defeat to the

Tories in Derbyshire was followed by the loss of

Lancashire and largest party status in Cumbria. There are many marginal seats in these areas for the Conservatives to target.

 

The Lib Dems had a standstill election and will be hoping

for more support when the Brexit issue comes centre

stage in the General Election. UKIP had to rely on a

popular taxi driver in Padiham for their only council

success. They should have developed policies on non-EU

issues to offer a real alternative for blue collar Labour

voters in the North. Instead they squabbled over who

should be leader.

 

In Scotland, the Tories have become the rallying point for

opponents of a second independence referendum, and

even though the fall off in support for the SNP was slight,

that irresistible tide has peaked.

 

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