Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been sent a warning (Image: Getty)
Rachel Reeves has been warned her economic growth plans could cost Labour the next election by focusing too much on the south.
Andy Burnham, the Labour mayor of Greater Manchester, criticised as “frustrating” the Chancellor’s announcements that the Government will back expansion of and new developments around Cambridge and Oxford to create thousands of high-tech jobs.
He said: “Whenever the next general election comes, two things already seem clear: it will be unlike any we have experienced before, and it will be won or lost in the north of England.”
He warned Labour mayors and ministers “have three months” to ensure Ms Reeves included investment for the north in her spending review on June 11.
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Mr Burnham made the comments as Deputy Prime Minister spoke at Convention of the North conference in Preston with a pledge to give mayors more control over transport and economic development.
He suggested Labour faced a threat from Reform, which came second in 87 Labour-held constituencies in last year’s general election, many of them in the north west.
Mr Burnham said: “We need to face up to it fully now and start preparing the ground for a campaign that won’t be a traditional choice from the lineup of the main parties but of two fundamentally different worldviews. The stakes are extraordinarily high.
“The world is changing at a pace we haven’t experienced before. Yet UK politics still, at times, seems frustratingly stuck in decades-old default positions. Going forward, a vision for growth based on London, Oxford and Cambridge – the ‘golden triangle’ – and airport expansion in the south-east is only justifiable if balanced by a new deal for the north; one that offers at least an equal ambition for economic, social and environmental renewal.”
In an article for the Guardian published to tie in with the Convention, he said: “By my reckoning, Labour mayors and ministers have three months in which to write that new story for the north so that it can be signed off at the spending review in June and delivered over the rest of this parliament.
“By the time the country next goes to the polls, we need to be able to point to tangible results telling a compelling story of how the second quarter of this century will be better than the false promises of a Northern Powerhouse and levelling up in the first.”
Ms Rayner, who is also Local Government Secretary, told her audience of business leaders, mayors and council leaders that the Government’s plan to give more control to the regions mark the “biggest power shift in a generation”.
She said: “I know that the North is impatient as anyone for real change – and I am too.”
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The Government hopes to create mayors across the country, following what is seen as the success of Mr Burnham as well as former West Midlands Mayor Andy Street, who was in the role for seven years.
Regions that will elect a mayor for the first time in 2026 include Cumbria, Cheshire & Warrington, Norfolk & Suffolk, Greater Essex, Sussex & Brighton and Hampshire & Solent
Voters in Hull & East Yorkshire will elect a mayor for the first time on May 1 this year, with Reform UK announcing that Olympic boxer Luke Campbell is to be their candidate. Greater Lincolnshire also holds its first mayoral election.
Under Ms Rayner’s plans, mayors will take over some train stations and bus services, and will have a seat on boards overseeing health services.