Labour needs a cabinet minister for left-behind communities to help counter Reform threat: Stephen Houghton

Centre and centre left politicians are seen as failing the people they are particularly supposed to represent – working class communities in towns like mine in Barnsley.

Listening to those working people is all too often branded as populist and wrong. The distance between them and their elected representatives has got wider and wider, with the political consequences now staring us in the face.

As we know the beneficiaries of this in the UK has been the Reform Party.

Not because Reform have some magical solutions to public concerns but simply because they are not the political establishment which has become discredited in the public eyes.

Reform is much more than a party. It has become a movement for change and something upon which disaffected members of the public can attach their own grievances.

So, what is to be done for Labour politicians who are now at the apex of that disillusionment and anger?

Well 30 years of declining trust in our democracy is not easily reversed but they can at least try. The Spending Review represents the latest opportunity for government to show that it understands the seriousness of the challenge and has the willingness to deliver.

This will not happen overnight, and any extra funding for our left behind communities should be welcomed. However, this must form a clear, tangible plan which everyone can buy into.

Here is how we can deliver this:

Firstly, the government needs a clear vision and a narrative to demonstrate that it understands the challenges facing people in areas like mine. A story of a better future. A clear sense of direction and sense of optimism. Not just for the big cities and the middle classes but for the towns and countryside, for everyone the length and breadth of our country.

In the last general election 40 per cent of the electorate did not vote. These are the working-class communities I talk about. We need a story to re-engage them.

Politics in the UK has become a middle-class exercise, divorced from the lived experience of everyday people outside of our metropolitan centres.

We also need to show in telling that story we are serious in both the telling and delivery of it.

Secondly, we need someone to help tell this story at the heart of government.

Nothing less than a Cabinet Minister with the role of leading, supporting and recovering these left behind communities will do.

Someone to champion those places, to fight their corner in government, to future proof government policy and to put the squeeze on the Treasury to get the investment required to rebalance our economy is essential.

Thirdly, and a point which I have made many times - our poorest communities experienced not just deindustrialisation and economic decline they have been at the heart of austerity.

We need to rebalance spending on local government services to those in most need. It doesn’t require more money; it requires political will. It would show government has serious intent.

With the Spending Review upon us, the Chancellor’s announcements on departmental spending will set the tone for the next four years. It is an essential opportunity to signal to voters that the government understands these issues and is brave and bold enough to deliver, and to convince a struggling population we care we need short term as well as long term interventions.

A short-term revenue package to support struggling families with the cost of living is crucial. People live and vote in the here and now. Jam tomorrow doesn’t cut it anymore. If Labour wants a second term long term capital investment alone won’t do it. It is revenue that wins elections not capital.

Of course, the nation’s economy needs growth, and we need to invest to secure that growth but again we need to be careful how we do it.

Simply investing in London and the big cities will only widen the economic gap between those big cities and the rest.

We need significant investment in our towns and beyond. We need to rebalance economic performance and give hope for future generations that is missing in too many places. A decent quality of life no matter where you live should be the aim.

Telling and delivering a new story may not be a panacea for all our economic and social ills. But it’s a start. The social and political consequences of not doing so are too frightening to think about for both the government and the country.

Sir Stephen Houghton is Leader of Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council and chair of the Special Interest Group of Municipal Authorities