Mayors say white paper 'step in right direction' for levelling up, but more funds needed

Yorkshire’s mayors have cautiously received the Government’s “step in the right direction” with the Levelling Up White Paper, but say more funding is needed to make sure they have the “tools to do the job.”

Dan Jarvis and Tracy Brabin both described Michael Gove’s 332 page publication as “positive” yesterday but had reservations about how the big promises could be achieved.

The Levelling Up Secretary based his plan around 12 national “missions” covering areas including economy, housing, education, transport and culture with targets for dramatic improvements by 2030.

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Setting out the contents of a much-anticipated White Paper, Mr Gove told MPs it would “make opportunity more equal and to shift wealth and power decisively towards working people and their families”.

“We need to allow overlooked and undervalued communities to take back control of their destiny,” he said.

“Because we know that, while talent is spread equally across the United Kingdom, opportunity is not.”

Mayor of South Yorkshire Dan Jarvis said the announcements could mark “the start of something significant” if Ministers are willing to “put real resources” into partnership with the region.

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Mr Jarvis, who also serves as MP for Barnsley Central said: “The government’s Levelling Up White Paper is a step in the right direction.

“but without the means to achieve the positive ambition it sets out.”

He believes that “mayors and Local Authorities will still largely be left to fight each other for funding pots ultimately controlled by Whitehall” without more cash promises.

He added: “Without the funding needed for real change, the government’s promises of levelling up will remain hollow. This White Paper gets some things right, but two long years after the election the Conservatives fought on the promise that levelling up would be their ‘defining mission’, many people across the country will be left asking themselves – is this it?”

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In West Yorkshire, Mayor Tracy Brabin similarly said “It’s positive that the Government recognises the urgent need to level up across the nation but the money it promises is nowhere near enough.”

Speaking after the announcement, the former MP for Batley and Spen said: “Our talent and potential can match anywhere in the country.

“But the ambitions of today’s White Paper need to be backed up by further commitments from the Treasury.

“The Government have made countless promises over the last decade to strengthen regional economies. We’ve had the Northern Powerhouse, we’ve had local industrial strategies, all of which have asked local areas to chop and change their priorities.

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“The test for this White Paper will be whether they deliver on their promises to empower local leaders, simplify funding, and give us the freedoms and flexibilities we need to deliver for our communities.”

In all, the White Paper includes 12 national “missions” to be achieved by 2030 to be enshrined in a flagship Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill.

They include a promise that public investment in research and development outside the “greater South East” of England will increase by at least 40 per cent; more than 90 per cent of children will leave England’s primary schools meeting the expected standards in reading, writing and maths and the gap in healthy life expectancy between will have narrowed between the highest and lowest areas.

Boris Johnson made “levelling up” a key theme of his 2019 election campaign, but the Covid-19 pandemic and the hit it caused to the nation’s finances have complicated efforts to develop the strategy.