PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham issued warning over ‘value’ of regional revenue hole
PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham’s mission to tackle regional inequalities must require investment on a scale no recent leader has come close to meeting, experts have warned
‘PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham has rightly put regional inequality at the top of his agenda’(Image: AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham’s mission to tackle regional inequalities must require investment on a scale no recent leader has come close to meeting, experts have warned.
The Resolution Foundation think-tank shows today that regional income gap between rich and poor areas has remained stubbornly high for 30 years. Gross Household Disposable Income (GHDI) per person in London is £27,900 – three-fifths higher than Northern Ireland (at £17,300).
Disposable incomes in the highest income local area, Kensington and Chelsea – at £60,584 – is four-and-a-half times higher than the lowest in Leicester, at £13,398. The organisation said the gaps are “deeply entrenched throughout the country”.
More than half of the councils in the poorest fifth for income per person in 1997 were still in that position in 2023 – the year of the latest available data.
Ruth Curtice, Chief Executive of the Resolution Foundation, said: “The gap between rich places like Kensington and Chelsea and poor places like Leicester is just as high today as they were 30 years ago.
“There are bright spots. Employment and pay gaps have narrowed, and Manchester ’s remarkable revival shows that decline is not destiny. But the UK’s major cities, once the powerhouses of national economic growth, continue to underperform. PM-in-waiting Andy Burnham has rightly put regional inequality at the top of his agenda.”
But she added: “Turning ambition into reality will require investment in transport, housing and wider economic development on a scale that no recent political leader has come close to meeting. Unless that investment is taken seriously, the economic and political cost of Britain’s geographic divides will continue.”
It comes after Mr Burnham pledged in a major speech last week to overhaul the way the country is governed and promised to usher in “the biggest rebalancing of power our country has seen”.
Unveiling plans for a “No10 North” – to be based in Manchester – he said it would be the “nerve centre of a rewired Britain” and help drive the revitalisation of overlooked communities.
Powers will also be handed to mayors and local leaders, he said, adding: “It is time for Whitehall to accept that growth cannot be ordered from the top down. Instead, it can only be nurtured from the bottom up.”
