Poverty isn’t just a Northern issue Andy.

Yet his record in Manchester was abysmal… not sure that needs spreading across the country.

Mainly because Airmiles Andy then reverts to type and his tiresome professional northerner rhetoric immediately afterwards.

Again, utter rubbish. London and the south east are the only two regions of the country which contribute more in tax revenue than they receive in funding. They are subsidising everywhere else already and have done for decades. They receive far LESS funding per head than they would if regional administrations were properly devolved with local taxes spent locally.

Shared out? So not creating wealth for yourselves then, but expecting more subsidies from the areas that have been subsidising you already for decades and are already paying the highest tax rates ever during peacetime.

We hear the message loud and clear. That’s exactly the problem that hasn’t dawned on Airmiles Andy yet, but will when he and Healy have to produce a budget in the autumn if they think people in the south have any capacity or willingness to make even larger donations to the north than they do already.

Exactly. He is incapable of speaking without mentioning it.

I remain unconvinced that being a good mayor and being a good PM requires the same skillset. I thought Boris Johnson was a terrible PM but actually rather good as Mayor of London. I am still undecided on Andy but he really needs to stop with the Northern focus now he's in charge of the whole country.

Actually, the percentage of PMs from London constituencies over the last 100 years is slightly overrepresented compared to the proportion of the UK population that lives there, and for the SE. There is far larger overrepresentation of MPs from Welsh constituencies being the UK PM more than from any other region of the UK per head of population, by a very large margin.

The North West, North East, and West Midlands of England and Scotland are pretty close between proportion of PMs and proportion of UK population so have nothing to moan about (although a sad minority of those occupying these areas seem to have irremovable shoulder chips so still seem to find excuses for their endless and unjustified bitterness, apparently impervious to data).

The East of England, South West of England and East Midlands of England and Yorkshire and the Humber have cause for complaint, having been underrepresented in the number of PMs returned from those regions per head of population.

Northern Ireland has by far the most reason to complain, having had no MP of a constituency in the region being UK PM in the last century at all.

Isn’t “Airmiles Andy” Andrew Mountbatten Windsor? It’s going to get very confusing if there are two. Pretty unfair as well given the original is a sex offender. Maybe you need to find a new baseless insult @BlackSwansWearDoveFeathers.

No. Equal v equitable.

This is really interesting thanks. Pretty impressive CV.

Yes, that presser was a masterclass in effective political communication.

Except that, as the OP points out, there is more to representing the needs of the whole country than focussing on the North/South formulation. It's not a binary ---that's the point, so the men versus women comparison doesn't quite work.

Have you heard the podcast? He was asked about his own upbringing and life experiences, so of course he spoke about the North. And what exactly is so wrong with being proud and passionate about the place you come from?

The vast majority of people in the country - whether they are from the North or the South have far, far more in common with a so-called “professional Northener” than they do with the Old Etonians, the Chipping Norton set or the sons of stockbrokers who have dominated politics for years.

It’s very hard to take comments like this seriously, because there really is no objective measure by which his record in Manchester was “abysmal”. To say so contradicts both all the local economic data, and his continued electoral success: abysmal mayors don’t win 3 elections with over sixty percent of the vote share every time.

At worst, you could say there were some high profile policy failures in amongst Andy Burnham’s successes. You might even argue that previous Manchester City Council leaders had worked hard and well enough, so that Manchester would have boomed with or without Andy Burnham. Or that the success of Manchesterism may not translate to the rest of the country.

But if building the Bee Network, securing massive investment for the city's economic boom and - most relevant to this thread - harnessing and celebrating a place’s sense of identity and local pride is abysmal, then it’s the kind of abysmal the rest of the country could do with.

Yes, but “he’s said it so just accept it” is pretty weak.

We can look at his plans to devolve economic power, which focuses on metro mayors. About 40% of the UK pop lives in a metro mayor area:

Almost all of the North, much less of the South, very little of the poor south west, and none of Wales or Scotland.

Maybe he will announce new things. Or maybe a focus on the North is the right thing.

But objectively, his plan as it is now sits on top of a three-layer formal framework, where the North is in the top level, and some of the poorest non-North places sit in the bottom one.

For the record I think devolution is a very good thing, if done properly. It needs to involve serious devolution of tax so that areas that prosper keep a decent share of that return and thus have an incentive to create it.

And it needs to exclude veto powers over things that are a national issue like national infrastructure and power.

I disagree. There is no experience outside the political bubble (his whole cabinet has no private sector experience between them). And unlike pretty much every other PM he never held one of the great offices of state before becoming PM (chancellor, Home Secretary, foreign secretary).

It is interesting he has announced a tour of the UK. I wonder precisely where he will go though.
I hope this is because he realises that he needs to be seen to be the PM for all and not the North and he is sensitive to that.
I hope he doesn’t visit the usual well known places of deprivation but seeks to explore more widely.

I’m a bit worried that it’s a cost-of-living tour not a growth tour though.

It suggests he thinks the main job is to make things cheaper rather than making the country richer.

I agree there are hard to reach areas of rural and costal poverty. It has proved to be an intractable issue in the U.K. all parties have struggled with it.
One of the issues is these area keep on voting Tory locally and nationally and now they are voting Reform. Even if power is devolved to these areas and they vote Reform the policies needed to solve long term inter generational poverty probably won’t happen.
If you give power to local people then they get what they vote for. Devolved power has worked and is working in the big northern cities, I am not as confident about other areas. However, one of the criticisms of Labour is that it encourages the nanny state and this is the opposite of that.
AB is not mentioning Wales and Scotland as they don’t need devolution as they have their own parliaments with more power than the metro mayors.
I do think spreading power and success to rural areas is going to be hard - doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.
And once again for those at the back - I want all the country to benefit not just the North - I would harbour no resentment if the focus was on coastal poverty, unlike southerners who seem outraged the focus is no longer on them.

Thatcher never held any of the great offices of state. Her only cabinet experience was education. Obviously Blair and Cameron, as incoming PMs following a GE, didn’t either.

Gosh @BIossomtoes you seem to have uncovered a two tier attitude towards AB. I’m shocked!

It is not true that “pretty much every other PM held one of the great offices of state before becoming PM”. Tony Blair had never served in Government prior to 1997. David Cameron also had no front bench government experience before entering Downing Street - and he didn’t even shadow one of the great offices of state. He was shadow for education, wasn’t he? As was Margaret Thatcher - who also never held a great office of state before becoming Prime Minister. You could very easily argue that Andy Burnham is in fact one of the most politically experienced Prime Ministers in modern history.