‘Don’t look back in anger!’ Localis report advises Burnham to go ‘Back to the future’ in learning from previous local growth policy
With Manchester’s music the soundtrack of Andy Burnham, a new report from Localis urges the incoming prime minister to show true faith in localism and learn lessons from previous growth policy in bringing his vision of ‘Manchesterism’ to England’s local political economies.
And with a nod to the popular culture of an earlier decade, ‘Back to the future?: lessons we can learn in our quest for local economic growth’, analyses attempts made by central government from Thatcher to Starmer to establish local growth.
Report author, and Localis visiting fellow, David Godfrey, identifies three central themes: get the basics right; plan strategically and spatially; and prioritise delivery.
Breaking these down, “Getting the basics right” identifies the fundamental relationship with business as the driving force of the local economy, urging strengthened local business relations, and engaging with the largest economic ‘beasts’ to deliver growth and attract investment.
Economic geographies – which may not be the same as administrative boundaries – must be understood and the role of devolved places in “local diplomacy” should be recognised in building investment pipelines and attracting international investors. Mayors or leaders must be seen as the accountable face of their place, with real decision-making powers, and be held to account as such.
Spatial development strategies are welcomed as investment frameworks to give developers certainty and offer the opportunity to deploy new spatial planning powers to deliver an ‘infrastructure first’ approach that can secure investment in critical infrastructure.
Through devolution, the integration of local skills and growth plans must offer the opportunity for all to provide the skills that local businesses need to grow.
With an overriding focus on delivery, mayors and local leaders should clearly define growth priorities and deploy planning powers like Development Corporations to build private sector confidence and release new sources of infrastructure funding, while unlocking major opportunities across multiple planning boundaries. But it should not be development at all costs – with good design and beauty backed to support quality, energy efficiency and streamlined planning.
Localis visiting fellow, David Godfrey, said: “Over the last 25 years, like many of us in and around local and central government, I’ve seen, and worked in or with, a whole alphabet soup of government-backed agencies established to deliver local growth.
“Governments of all colours have created their own agents of growth in their efforts to drive local economies.
“And with mayoral devolution now broadly the model of choice, but with differing paces of delivery across the country, an understanding of previous practice can be invaluable if national and local objectives are to be met.
“Whatever the protestations of localism, it is understandable too that Government will want to stamp its mark on local growth, both to get the economy moving quickly and to have some control over how this is done.
“So, with an incoming Burnham government publicly committed to local growth, but with a struggling economy and business confidence lacking, it’s not only timely, but telling, to ask what might we learn from these economic relics – if anything?”
Localis chief executive, Jonathan Werran, said: “With a new team in Number 10 and a new Number 10 of the North to look forward to, Andy Burnham is poised like a new actor reprising the role of Van Helsing to drive a stake in the vampiric issue that has beset every government since the war, regional economic inequality and a productivity gap that stubbornly refuses to narrow.
“Starting with this essay, Localis and David Godfrey will be closely investigating over the coming months the vital and irreplaceable role that business can play in making this version of devolution a success for all four corners of England, from urban to polycentric, from coastal to rural.”