'Northern Big Bang': MPs react to report calling for billions in private investment to 'level up' Northern economy

Billions of pounds of private sector investment should be unlocked and used to create an economic Big Bang for the North, says a new report.

The report from the Centre for Policy Studies and Northern Research Group of MPs says more investment is needed to “level up” the economy and boost the North.

“A Northern Big Bang” sets out a series of recommendations on how to stimulate private sector investment and create a globally recognised, economic powerhouse in the North of England.

The calls have been met with equal amounts support and scepticism from the borough’s politicians, who back the idea of more investment for the North while questioning the Government’ ability to fulfil such a pledge.

The report calls for a new Initial Investment Incentive – a cash payment to attract new investments and global capital to the region. At present the Northern economy, measured by Gross Value Added per capita, is three quarters the size of England’s average.

This could be focused explicitly on green growth and meeting Net Zero, for example by incentivising investment into new gigafactories which would help spur a Green Industrial Revolution.

The paper also calls for automatic approval for planning applications which create more than 100 permanent new jobs in the region when they have not been determined within two months, and an optional, alternative, fast-track planning process for investors planning to plough £20 million into the local economy, or whose investment will unlock over 250 jobs.

Wigan MP Lisa Nandy, a member of the Centre for Towns campaign group, said: “The report is right to call for more investment in the North but ignores the divisions within the North itself.

“For decades towns like Wigan have been ignored or overlooked in favour of investment in our major cities in the hope the benefits would trickle out. You only need to take a walk down our high street to see that they haven’t. It beggars belief that this Conservative Government hasn’t yet realised that an economic model that has failed us for decades is not going to level up the north.

“After ten years of cutting funding for our NHS, our council and our local police services, it is time the Government woke up. We deserve our fair share of investment in towns across the North, the right to decide how to spend it and an end to the devastation the Tories have visited on our communities for a decade.

“Under cover of Covid they are cutting our direct rail link to Manchester Piccadilly, closing our town centre post office and standing aside while we lose major retailers like Debenhams and WH Smith alongside local pubs, restaurants and businesses.

“Despite a raft of election promises to level up the North this Tory Government is doing what it always does. Every single Northern Powerhouse promise has been broken. They simply cannot be trusted to deliver for us here in Wigan.”

Makerfield MP Yvonne Fovargue, while welcoming the idea of the Northern Big Bang, was sceptical about whether the government would take action. She also said the idea to replicate Thatcher’s radical overhaul filled her “with horror.”

Ms Fovargue said: “Whilst it is welcome that the report calls for investment in the North - frankly, we have heard this all before and action never follows the rhetoric from Government Ministers. The call to mimic the radical approach of the Thatcher Government fills me with horror as someone who lived through the era and saw the destruction, asset stripping and mass unemployment her policies inflicted on the north.”

On recommendations on planning Ms Fovargue added: “Some of the recommendations such as automatic approval of planning applications would remove local accountability and the ability of communities to shape future development.”

Leigh and Bolton West MPs, James Grundy and Chris Green, have been approached for their views.

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