CIVIL SERVANTS-THE BARRIER TO POWER FOR THE NORTH.

STAND ASIDE WHITEHALL.

The Conservative and Labour parties are now broadly in agreement about what needs to be done about the North-South divide.

I still think the Coalition was wrong to destroy the Regional Development Agencies and Labour needs to add a Council of the North to its plans to beef up the Local Enterprise Partnerships and Combined Authorities.

However even with our two main political parties broadly agreed on how to devolve resources and power to the North, there is a major obstacle in their path. It is secretive and bitterly opposed to any policy that would take power and influence away from Whitehall. It is the Civil Service. They used to wear bowler hats, now they are less identifiable. Their appearance might change but they’re basic attitude to the North will never change.

They know little about our area. They regard the North as a place populated with people with begging bowls, trying to get money which they haven’t the expertise to spend. They sometimes acknowledge people like Manchester Council leader Sir Richard Leese, but generally believe northern politicians are Town Hall minnows who can’t be trusted with the cash. At a recent conference I heard one former senior Treasury official bragging that as far as civil servants are concerned there never has been a regional policy.

This situation has prevailed for many decades even when there were civil servants in regional government offices. Some tried to make a difference, most couldn’t wait for a posting back to London.

Tony Blair invaded Iraq but he never had the guts to demand his civil servants implement John Prescott’s vision for well resourced development agencies democratically controlled by assemblies. We elect the politicians and they should tell the civil servants, with the threat of dismissal, to get on with what the elected government propose.

So let’s see what happens after the election. Both parties want to devolve money and power to the North. I forecast the civil service will first of all go slow, then the Treasury will reduce the money available, then the powers will be trimmed.

I hope I am wrong but it is going to need Cities Minister Greg Clarke or Labour’s Lord Adonis to have the full support of Cameron or Miliband to get this done.

JUNKER: THE DEMOCRATIC CHOICE.

We are set to celebrate Magna Carta. It was the start of democracy but when the democratic choice of the European Parliament gets the top job, people cry foul.

David Cameron says the Council of Ministers is more democratic than the European Parliament. How does that work? We directly elected our MEPs who’s political groups had decided who should be their candidates for President of the European Commission. Junker was the centre right choice. They got most seats. Bingo.

David Cameron was first elected as an MP, then became Prime Minister in which capacity he attends the Council of Ministers. I don’t see how he’s able to claim greater democratic authenticity than the European Parliament.

Anyway Cameron now faces a very difficult task in getting sufficient concessions to convince a Tory Party, and probably the British people, that we should stay in.

TOUR DE LEEDS.

Very best wishes to Leeds and Yorkshire this weekend as the Tour de France begins in the fair county.

It is a huge opportunity for the region and a tribute to the people from business, sport and politics who have made it possible.

THE UNFINISHED MAP OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT

 

 

Forty years ago this week local government boundaries across the North were ripped up in a major reform of how we are governed locally. It was meant to herald a more efficient system of administration with functions being carried out at an appropriate level reflecting communities that people could identify with.

 

In fact the last forty years has seen continued tinkering with the system, the scrapping and then the reinventing of city regions and, in some areas, a refusal of people to come to terms with the 1974 settlement. There is still much to do.

 

In 1974 local government across the north consisted of a patchwork of county boroughs covering the main population centres with a series of small urban and rural councils around them with boundaries that did not reflect the urban expansion since the Second World War.

 

In 1969 very wise man called Lord Redcliffe-Maud proposed that most people should have one tier of local government. His idea was rejected but it remains the obvious solution to this day. Instead the Heath government decided to create metropolitan councils for West Yorkshire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside. They dealt with transport, police, fire and structural planning whilst metropolitan districts handled schools, housing, social services and collected the rates.

 

The old shire counties had chunks taken out of them. Yorkshire lost Saddleworth to Oldham and Todmorden to Lancashire. The Saddleworth White Rose Society still campaigns for the old historic boundary. Cheshire lost Wirral to Merseyside. Lancashire,who’s southern border had been the Mersey, lost communities from Stretford and Whiston and Ashton and Droylesden to the mets and in the North the Furness area to Cumbria. Perhaps most contentious was the incorporation of Southport into Merseyside. A Southport Party campaigning to return the resort to Lancashire has enjoyed poll success in Sefton Council elections.

 

 

 

Cities like Manchester were never happy with an upper tier authority over them and shed few tears when the metropolitan counties became collateral damage in a war between Margaret Thatcher and Ken Livingstone, leader of the Greater London Council in the mid 1980s.

 

There was turbulence in the shire counties too. In Lancashire, Blackpool and Blackburn became all purpose authorities in 1998. It was typical of the piecemeal nature of local government reform in recent decades. Why wasn’t Preston given unitary status? Why have 12 district councils in Lancashire and yet in 2009 reduce the number of councils in Cheshire to two?

 

There was a moment of hope that a real overall coherent vision would be given to all this when John Prescott proposed regional assemblies to democratise the work of the Regional Development Agencies. It would have required unitary local government throughout the North, reducing the number of politicians not increasing them as critics of Prescott mislead people into believing.

 

Prescott was replaced by the current Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles who vowed to oppose any more reorganisation. In fact under the current government we have seem the rise of Combined Authorities in Greater Manchester and soon in Merseyside and West Yorkshire. They are reinventions of the metropolitan councils of 1974 recognising that there is a need for strategic thinking in the mets.

 

In Greater Manchester the antagonisms of 1974-86 have been avoided. The jury is still out elsewhere particularly in the Liverpool City Region.

 

A plethora of initiatives have been launched by this government. Local Enterprise Partnerships, elected mayors, City Deals etc. It is a confusing mess which people don’t understand and have little democratic control over.

 

Forty years on from the reform of 1974 we await the government with the guts to override petty local politics and introduce root and branch reform of our constitution from the House of Lords to parish council.

 

 

 

SMART CITIES IN THE NORTH

 

 

A couple of weeks ago I questioned the excessive concentration on cities in rebuilding the economy of the North. I stand by what I said but two events I have attended in the last few days have shown that the scale of networking possible in Manchester and Liverpool is bearing fruit.

 

The launch of the Heseltine Institute at Liverpool University and the range of inspirational speakers at our own Downtown Smart City event in Manchester pointed to a more optimistic future. That optimism extends to Preston which hopes to build on its success attracting private sector jobs with plans for new developments in a central business district, the markets and around the bus station, not forgetting elegant Winckley Square. Then there is Leeds. The opening of Trinity Leeds retail development and the First Direct Arena is to be followed by another major retail scheme at Victoria Gate while the Aire Valley Enterprise Zone is expecting to benefit from the upturn in the economy.

 

SMART MANCHESTER.

 

But Manchester leads the way in the North, a fact acknowledged by Emma Jones of Enterprise Nation when she spoke at our Smart City conference. She seemed slightly irritated that there was any question that London didn’t take Manchester seriously. However it was the contribution of Mike Emmerich that made the biggest impression on me. He is boss of the New Economy. It’s a think tank going research into the Greater Manchester economy. He was talking about how his organisation, Manchester City Council and Manchester University were all working to exploit the isolation of the wonder product graphene on campus in 2004 . One atom thick, the product’s strength and potential for use in displays, electronics and energy storage is going to be truly revolutionary. But is it going to follow most of the other great discoveries made in this country and be exploited elsewhere? Not if Mike and Nancy Rothwell (Vice Chancellor of Manchester University) have their way. But think tanks, councils and universities can only do so much. Jobs have to be created by private firms moving in. Well, there’s good news on that front.

 

The decision by graphene manufacturer Bluestone to locate on the campus in a £5m research partnership is great news for the city’s economy especially when one bears in mind they could have located anywhere in the world.

 

Manchester city centre is sorted in terms of regeneration but what about the zone between the city and the suburbs? Gavin Eliot of BDP Architects told the Smart City conference that this was the fragmented zone and outlined its potential. He pointed in particular to the developments around the City Of Manchester Stadium.

Finally, if there are any climate change deniers left after the Philippines storm, they should listen to Vincent Walsh. His Biospheric Foundation offers Manchester a chance to recycle virtually everything to produce food and heat.

 

THE HEZZA INSTITUTE.

 

Liverpool University have taken the brilliant decision to set this up before the grim reaper takes Tarzan from us.

 

In the gritty surroundings of the Camp and Furnace arts space in the city’s Baltic Quarter Lord Heseltine reflected on his 35 year association with the city. In the words of its director Prof. Alan Harding the Institute will be drawing on experience from round the world and applying them to the practical problems of how places operate to try and make them better for us all.

 

It will sound a bit pie in the sky until it produces some solutions for us but Liverpool Council’s Chief Executive was there and it is another example of a city bringing together its experts to look to the future for the North in the 21st century.

 

I suggested their first report could be into the way England is governed. With Wales getting more power and Scotland being bribed to stay in the UK, we need to look at the mess around English governance. Two tier councils, Combined Authorities, Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), talk of localism whilst centralising much decision making, let the Heseltine Institute get its teeth into that!

 

Lord Heseltine told me afterwards he regretted the government’s abolition of the Government Office North West which he had set up, but felt now efforts should be directed to beefing up the LEPs. He remained convinced of the importance of northern cities which he believed created our wealth in the nineteenth century and could do again.