Exclusive:Sir Simon Clarke criticises levelling up policies as 'a little bit performative'

“With three prime ministers in as many years, it was very hard to articulate, even as a candidate, what we were trying to do,” he admitted.

Sir Simon, who lost his seat in the “shattering” election, spoke of his enthusiasm for returning to frontline politics in the future.

Now, as director of Conservative think tank Onward, he has been leading research into how the Tories could potentially return to power in four years’ time.

Sir Simon said: “I think it's really important that we continue with what we were calling leveling up.”

However, the former Levelling Up Secretary under Liz Truss admits that was an element “which felt a little bit performative”.

“So just have a nice bench, have a new plant, here's a bit of money for your high street.

“I'm not downplaying the importance of visuals on community vibe and confidence.

“What I want to see more of is what we have managed to deliver on Teesside.

“Ben [Houchen] is a poster boy for how to make devolution work. That's meaningful reindustrialization.”

Sir Simon cited the jobs coming in through the Tees Valley Mayor’s projects on wind and carbon capture, utilisation and storage.

“A legacy of tragic industrial decline has actually been reversed,” he explained.

Sir Simon also praised the growth of the renewables industry in Hull, with Siemens Gamesa currently making 300 wind turbine blades for a new North Sea farm.

“That is real levelling up because that is essentially creating jobs and self-sustaining success,” he said.

“What I don't want is for Yorkshire, or anywhere else in the UK, to be permanently living off government grants.”

He said he didn’t think the pride and growth seen across the North during the Victorian era is “beyond our reach to deliver again”.

Speaking of Onward, he said: “Part of our focus is very much on how we re-industrialise and create new opportunities for a new generation.

“I think that prize is levelling up as people actually want it to happen - restoring dignity and purpose.”

In 2019, Boris Johnson was elected on a promise to level up England, winning swathes of Northern seats from Labour.

One of the key policies was to allocate central government funds to councils for specific projects, however cash-strapped local authorities spent at least £27 million producing bids, with many not being awarded a penny from the government.

Dozens of the most deprived areas in England were left out of the second round of the Levelling Up Fund (LUF), while three of the least deprived areas were awarded funding, including Richmond in former Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s constituency.

However, Sir Simon believes that the feeling of being left behind is still pervasive across the North’s towns, something confirmed by Onward’s recent polling.

“People in Batley, the Calder Valley, or Scarborough, these sort of places where it's just really unclear what the future holds, are rightly a bit fed up just the sense in which things are gradually getting worse,” he said.

“I continue to believe in that sense Boris put his finger on it, and that's why we won such a huge majority in 2019.”