Earlier this month, a job advertisement appeared on a British civil service website for the senior position of overseeing a regeneration project in northeast England. Despite being an advert for a high-paid job, it courted outrage — not only would the position be “London-based”, it would also involve “occasional trips to Tees Valley”. To many, it seemed to exemplify the long-standing snobbishness or ‘southern-centricity’ of those in power.
The north-south divide has been a long-running issue through modern British political and public life. The north, once the powerhouse of industrial and imperial Britain, swiftly lost out in the 1970s and 1980s as the economy, under the aegis of Margaret Thatcher, reconfigured itself and became more services-oriented.
Successive governments have made attempts to bridge the gap, or, at the very least, shown a willingness to try mitigating the problem. The former Chancellor George Osborne pledged to build a “Northern Powerhouse”, which would close the “decades-old economic gap between north and south”, through investment in transport, universities, health care, and manufacturing. The government had also pledged devolution of powers to cities and regions, in areas such as transport and social care.
Neglect of infrastructure
Several years on, there is growing scepticism about the new government’s commitment to these pledges to the north, particularly at a time of fiscal austerity. In July, the government provoked an outcry by confirming that it would provide support to Crossrail 2, a multibillion-pound rail line close to the capital, just days after scrapping electrification of certain sections of mainlines in Wales and in Sheffield (in the north of the country).
Andy Burnham, the vocal Labour Mayor of Greater Manchester, pledged to work with other Mayors across the north to challenge the government’s “neglect of transport in the north”. “The time has passed where we can take these decisions lying down,” he warned in July. Over 85,000 have signed an online petition calling for the government to pump more money into transport in the north.
The Institute for Public Policy Research has noted that public spending on transport in London had been more than double that in the north and that the gap is set to worsen, with dire consequences for the country, particularly as it seeks to strengthen its industries and domestic capabilities ahead of Brexit. “Lack of government spending on Northern transport is holding the whole economy back. Northern prosperity is national prosperity,” it warned.
The warning was reiterated last week by Mr. Osborne, who now heads the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, and who urged the government to avoid turning Britain a “one trick pony”. He called for sizeable investments into northern infrastructure: while the northern cities could not individually be a counterweight to London, they could together attract considerable global interest, he argued.
Prime Minister Theresa May and others have been quick to ridicule the suggestion that they’ve turned attention away from the north, but the pressure on them will continue to build. An academic study published in August found a shockingly large gap between the north and the south when it came to premature deaths of young adults, with signs that things were worsening after decades of improvement. “This profound and worsening structural inequality requires more equitable economic, social and health policies,” it warned.
Vidya Ram writes for The Hindu and is based in London
