How should we “level” Britain?


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What does it mean?

Leveling up means reducing the inequality between locations while improving results in all locations. The term has been used in educational policy debates over the past few decades and taken up by Boris Johnson as the core of his post-Brexit mission.

At least the problem is clear: According to OECD figures, Great Britain is one of the regionally most unequal economies in the advanced world. In terms of GDP per capita, London is way ahead of any other region, particularly Wales, north-east England and Northern Ireland.

In addition, it is also very unequal on a number of other metrics, including total wealth, health, educational attainment, and social mobility. And at the local level, Britain has the greatest inequality among the predominantly rich countries in the OECD club, reflecting the fact that differences within regions are even greater than differences between them. London, for example, is over-represented at both the top and bottom of the income distribution.

What is the current government’s plan?

The new Department for Leveling Up, Housing and Communities – headed by Michael Gove – defines leveling “every part of the UK” as the “central mission” of this government. This is to be achieved by “empowering local leaders and communities …; Raising the standard of living, especially where it is lower; Disseminating opportunities and improving public services, especially where they are weak; and restoring local pride ”. The White Paper promised by the Prime Minister for this year with concrete political proposals is still described as “in preparation”.

Do we know something?

We have the sweeping commitments made in the 2019 Conservative Manifesto, which promised to “increase opportunities” across the UK by investing in cities, rural areas and coastal areas; give these areas more control over how investments are made; Skills enhancement through apprenticeships and a £ 3 billion National Skills Fund; Making life easier for agriculture and fishing; and the creation of up to ten free ports to stimulate trade in disadvantaged communities.

As for the steps in the new department, we have a new leveling up fund of $ 4.8 billion so far. One example given by the department is major highway improvements around Birmingham city center. A total of 106 successful bids worth £ 1.7 billion were announced, including the reopening of the Whorlton suspension bridge in County Durham and the refurbishment of Leicester railway station.

But more is planned?

A UK Shared Prosperity Fund worth over £ 2.6 billion will be launched next year, aiming to improve opportunities in “places in need such as former industrial estates, deprived cities and rural and coastal communities, and for people in disadvantaged groups” in all of Great Britain ”. Its first priority will be “a locally deployed new adult computing program, Multiply, to help hundreds of thousands of adults improve their math”.

There is also a £ 3.6 billion Towns Fund, which aims to “promote regeneration and level towns from Birkenhead and Bloxwich to West Bromwich and Wakefield,” and a £ 150 million Community Ownership Fund that will be spent over four years aimed to help communities buy and renovate facilities that are threatened with closure – such as sports halls, theaters and parks.

So it’s just injecting a lot of money?

That’s the worry. A more ambitious version of the level-up, says Andrew Carter of the Center for Cities think tank, would cut the divisions’ spending lines and create a positive cycle in which separate policy agendas – net-zero, planning, and transportation reforms, for example – work towards it reinforce the others.

His think tank sees the core problem in the underperformance of British cities outside London – in terms of productivity – compared to secondary cities in similar countries. The underperformance of places like Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow explains much of the problem – they are responsible for nearly 60% of the economy’s lost output, which the think tank conservatively estimates at 4% of GDP per year.

The problem, as David Smith points out in The Times, is that these places have been spruced up in recent years, but without attracting the types of highly productive, exporting businesses that really make the difference economically. Fixing this should be a lot easier than increasing the performance of many smaller places. And those smaller places should be picked up anyway if their local towns do better. Giving more powers to the regions will be key to solving the problem.

Is any of this going to happen?

One promising sign is that Gove has co-opted former Bank of England chief economist Andy Haldane, who has long been a supporter of the leveling agenda. Haldane’s vision focuses on regional income and productivity gaps, and he has advocated and referred to a “new regional ecosystem” that encompasses infrastructure, innovation, skills, finance, social issues (making places to live beautifully) and governance Need to decentralize more power. Certainly, local delivery will be the key to getting results; many expect that some form of decentralization or reorganization of local government is on the table.

How is success measured?

Any real leveling will be the work of years and decades and will be measured in the distribution of wages, skilled jobs, and skilled workers across the country, Paul Johnson tells The Times. But there is an even more fundamental measure: life expectancy. A man in Glasgow or Blackpool dies ten years earlier than one in Hart, Hampshire because “people who are better off, have happier, fuller lives and good jobs live longer and healthier lives than those who don’t”. We know Ascension was successful when tragic loopholes like this one were closed.

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