Government more interested in North. Do we agree?

[DameLucy]

So I saw a snippet on the news that people in the South are upset because the North seems to be getting more help from the government lately. What’s our thoughts on this? I’m actually from the South and living in the South and I’m feeling pretty ashamed at this comment.
Thoughts. Am I being unreasonable?

I think there are some areas of the south that have been forgotten about, so I can understand if people are in those areas, but what help exactly are us northerners basking in?

I think the south have always had more funding than the north and it's about time it was levelled up. I'm from the Midlands so that make me impartial? 😂

God, 5 minutes of interest in the north (note I said "interest", not sure we've seen any money yet) and already the home counties are howling. The irony! I'm a Londoner who moved north 20 years ago and I'm embarrassed.

@AfternoonToffee

I think there are some areas of the south that have been forgotten about, so I can understand if people are in those areas, but what help exactly are us northerners basking in?

I dont think Buckinghamshire is one of them!

I haven’t noticed any sudden or vast improvement in living standards in my northern hometown or any of the pretty deprived surrounding towns and cities. In fact, many have undergone significant decline over the years. 🧐

They're interested in the areas that vote for them. Hence major cities like Birmingham are chronically underfunded.

What help, other than Boris's fine words, has the North actually had?

From the north, but lived in the south more than half my life. Anybody who thinks the north is getting more than the south is an idiot.

What help, other than Boris's fine words, has the North actually had?

Our new Conservative MP - first one in 50 something years, won the seat in December 2019 - took some photographs of himself in front of some flytipped rubbish, standing on the seafront, and carrying a clearly empty box into a food bank. He seems to genuinely believe this has cured all of the problems within the constituency.

I don’t think it’s that ‘the North’ is getting more or being prioritised. It’s more that the Conservative party policies now appeal to voters in those areas more than they do in the shires. The wealthy south east is remain, they care about foreign aid and the green belt. The Tory party just isn’t offering them anything right now.

I think many normal middle class people like doctors and teaches living in the Home Counties are fed up of being tarred with the brush of ‘metropolitan elite’

But we are a Powerhouse!
With joined up transport and, um, stuff...

The North is usually forgotten about- for a decent distance north of Newcastle we don't even have a dual carriageway.

I don’t think it’s quite as simple as ‘the south is cross because the north is getting focus/funding’.

Elections and particularly by-elections rely at least in part on a strong local retail offer, and the Tories didn’t have much on offer here. There were local (HS2) and national (planning reform) issues as well as a really strong Lib Dem ground game - and the Lib Dems are probably closer politically to the ‘usual’ Tory voter in Chesham and Amersham than the current Cabinet is.

Politically Britain seems to be recalibrating away from the old left/right into a much more culture/values-driven politics driven more by identity than ideology, and it will be hard for any party to maintain appeal over time to both a Remain-voting commuter belt seat and a staunchly Brexit-supporting former industrial town in the North East. It’s going to be an interesting decade - I can’t see how Labour can survive in its current form because of the split between traditional heartland and urban progressive electorates.

The North is usually forgotten about- for a decent distance north of Newcastle we don't even have a dual carriageway.

I remember in my driving test that the only bit of dual carriageway we did was technically a dual carriageway with two lanes, a central reservation, and then the other two lanes, but is only a mile long. The road was/still is a single carriageway that turns into a dual carriageway as it feeds onto a roundabout then it merges back into single carriageway as you exit the roundabout. So it's 40 down the single carriageway, a burst of national speed limit down the very short dual carriageway, and then back to 40 on the approach to the roundabout. There is a bigger dual carriageway but as its the main route in/out of the town centre and to/from pretty much everywhere around here, it's too congested to do a driving test on as you'd sit in traffic the entire time.

I was out of the house a lot since 12th April (I’m up north) and haven’t noticed any positive changes. But my life is pretty monotonous for the last 20 something years: I still have the same DH and my area is still voting Labour.

The government doesn't care north south east or west. Not specifically anyway.

Stoking division, be it regional north south, urban versus rural, age, or any other variation, is simply a useful distraction tactic to deflect from shit policies.

In reality, it's impossible to generalise. There are very affluent parts of the north and extremely deprived areas in the south. For example, London is the capital of homelessness - 165,000 homeless there, with two thirds of England's families in temporary accommodation living in London.

Here's a good article from Andy Burnham (who seems to have realised division isn't a good way to run a campaign).

www.standard.co.uk/comment/andy-burnham-government-anti-city-strategy-london-manchester-b941150.html

the news snippet is from the by-election and the tory voter feels that the government are giving all the money to the North paid for by her and her ilk in the south. Seems like a lovely person

I actually laughed out loud when the woman on the news said this. The South have had it cushy for years. Scotland is only in profile now because of Independence, if this wasn't going on you'd never hear about us. I actually feel for our Northern neighbours in Northumberland and Cumbria as I get the definite impression that the media and politicians thinks the North is Leeds or Manchester.

@StormyLovesOdd

I think the south have always had more funding than the north and it's about time it was levelled up. I'm from the Midlands so that make me impartial? 😂

As can be seen in recent threads this past week, if you get the 'levelling up', you'll soon find that the 'investment' isn't to be envied at all. Quite the opposite. London is the capital of homelessness. A consequence of the 'investment'.

And I don't know about the rest of the south, but London is the only region in the UK that pays in more tax than it gets back. Yet 165,000 Londoners are without one of life's most basic essentials. A settled home.

The wealthy south east

I agree that the North needs investment. But parts of the south east are far from wealthy.

As for the Amersham and Chesham result. Its Buckinghamshire. Tony Blair lives not too far. Lots of Remain voters live there. People who now lean towards the Lib Dems.

The south isn't all one homogeneous grouping. Likewise the north.

@DameAlyson

The wealthy south east

I agree that the North needs investment. But parts of the south east are far from wealthy.

Exactly.

London is in the south east. And it's the capital of homelessness. You can't get much more deprived than being homeless.

@Jarstastic

I think many normal middle class people like doctors and teaches living in the Home Counties are fed up of being tarred with the brush of ‘metropolitan elite’

I think doctors and nurses should remember they are the elite to many deprived areas in the north. The vast majority of young people in the NE still don't go university.

And, everywhere - across the UK - within areas thought of as wealthy, i.e. York, Harrogate, Richmond (both the one in North Yorkshire, and the one in Greater London/Surrey) etc there are pockets of deprivation. And it's actually often worse being poor in a wealthy area. Not just the expense but the lack of support and help available... because the area is stereotyped as being wealthy, ignoring the varied experiences that exist in every part of the country.