The Guardian view on the north: a better transport network is good but not enough
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Version 0 of 1. In his 2013 book The North, Paul Morley quotes from an interview in which Morrissey, son of Manchester, said to an interviewer: “You’re southern – you wouldn’t understand. When you’re northern, you’re northern for ever, and you’re instilled with a certain feel for life that you can’t get rid of. You just can’t.” Many northerners of all generations will recognise the truth of that, even today. And they will also know that, although many of the old industrial-era contrasts with the south have become more blurred in post-industrial, digital Britain, many others remain. Though there are, and always were, many norths, the north as a whole remains a different England. Sometimes when Conservatives speak about England, this different England doesn’t get a look in. There are in fact plenty of Conservative MPs in northern England, 43 of them at the last count. But the modern Tory party’s emotional centre of gravity is more southern today than in the 20th century. It now has virtually no seats in parliament from the large northern cities – Morrissey’s birthplace in Davyhulme was represented by Sir Winston Churchill’s grandson until the Tory wipeout of 1997 – nor much presence in local government there now either. The party’s self-interest and mentality have become increasingly defined by the needs of the southern counties and their seemingly unchanging prosperity, privilege and order. The Tories like to think of themselves as the party of England. Yet in the Tory English mentality, it can be as if the land between Leicestershire and Scotland somehow does not exist. To his credit, George Osborne is not one of these Conservatives. As a Cheshire MP and an unsentimental politician, but also as one who grasps that the Tory party will eventually have to regain standing in the north, the chancellor is at least north aware. Over the last year, he has talked about the north often, notably in his speeches about creating a so-called “northern powerhouse,” based on Manchester. This week’s budget speech was peppered with references to northern economic growth, to employment rates in the north-west, to “the great county of Yorkshire” creating more jobs than France, and, in pride of place, the devolution of additional business rates to Greater Manchester. On Friday , this was followed up by a never knowingly underhyped set of plans claiming “to revolutionise travel in the north”. The transport secretary, Patrick McLoughlin, a northerner himself, went to Stockport to launch “a long-term strategy to connect up the north, create a single economy and allow northern towns and cities to pool their strengths”. There would be high-speed train links between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Hull and other centres, widened motorways and tunnels to speed road transport through the Pennines and around the region, integrated ticketing systems and billions of pounds’ worth of new projects. Much of this work has been on the drawing board and in the pipeline for many years. Some of it was a reannouncement of earlier decisions. Bits of it were shameless pork barrel. Most of it will remain merely aspirational until the post-election spending review turns it (or more likely doesn’t) into realities. Most important of all, the promised integration of the north into one big thrumming transport system and economy leaves large parts of the region with nothing to show for it. Cumbria, central Lancashire, Northumberland, Newcastle and Teesside have not been invited to the party at all. The need for better-coordinated transport integration for the north, decided by the north, is hard to dispute. The modest devolution of additional income from business rates to Greater Manchester is hopefully a watershed in fiscal devolution more generally. But this remains a piecemeal, unstrategic approach, from which some of the neediest parts of the north have been excluded. It has been announced only weeks before an election, after long years of neglect. And there is no consistent system of accountability. Some attention to the north is better than no attention. But a comprehensive and consistent system of UK devolution which allowed the north – and the different norths – to make and be accountable for its decisions would be a much more convincing and sustainable approach. |