The other side of leveling up is resilience. We used to have lots of small abbatoirs, ,livestock markets and local supply chains. EU rules changed that, and yes I on balance voted Remain. Having left, let us make virtue out of necessity and downscale some things and bring purpose and bustle back to market towns. Also, I haven’t seen mentioned is getting rid of VAT which is one of the most regressive tax regimes out there.
VAT is the biggest sleight of hand ever. At a stroke it removed tax from people’s pay where it was clearly visible to being hidden amongst product prices. It also moved the tax burden from the wealthy towards those who spend almost their entire pay packet on living costs. It’s a regressive tax and should be scrapped
Ian nclfuzzy
2 years ago
Overly cynical.
I listened to Gove after his speech, in discussion with Seb Payne of the FT, who’s book Broken Heartlands, which deals a lot with leveling up, I’ve just finished reading. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECTWocSqClE
It’s clear to me (and it should be clear to you after watching the discussion) that Gove is fizzing with practical ideas about what leveling up is and what it isn’t. He’s also clear on the nature of the task – tidying up the High Street and/or microeconomic adjustments like in-work benefits really only alleviate symptoms and don’t address causes.
This is why Blairism failed the Regions – it’s mix of new public buildings, Surestart and mind-bogglingly complex personal tax credits ultimately did nothing sustainable. They were a 10 year sugar-rush.
Productivity improvements through better education and increased automation and quality work genuinely moving long-term out of the south-east will be the real drivers of sustainable leveling up.
Ferrusian Gambit
2 years ago
Focusing on a specific point here but…
Does Her Majesty’s Government really have a “Department for Levelling Up” now? Is this really what we’ve come to as a country, ministries named after a concepts in video games rather than the austere and dignified names of the past?
Last edited 2 years ago by Ferrusian Gambit
Keith Jefferson
2 years ago
If there are any budding investigative journalists out there with time on their hands, I would suggest investigating how the £4.8 Billion Levelling Up Fund (announced in the spring spending review) is being spent. The intention was to “support town centre and high street regeneration, local transport projects and cultural and heritage assets” (quote from gov.uk) which all sounds very nice. I “hear” that a lot of this money is being spent by policy wonks and city-based consultancies on drawing up environmental / sustainability / inclusivity etc. strategies for those economically deprived regions, i.e. creating lots of work for metropolitan graduates to produce some nice reports but providing little or no meaningful employment opportunities or benefits for those that actually live and work in those economically deprived areas. I know that the politicians can’t even agree amongst themselves what ‘levelling up’ is supposed to mean, but I think most people’s idea would not entail creating more jobs for metropolitan graduates. It sounds to me that the £4.8 Billion fund was set up with no idea as to how it should be spent and could be money going down the drain (or worse, being counter-productive).
The other side of leveling up is resilience. We used to have lots of small abbatoirs, ,livestock markets and local supply chains. EU rules changed that, and yes I on balance voted Remain. Having left, let us make virtue out of necessity and downscale some things and bring purpose and bustle back to market towns. Also, I haven’t seen mentioned is getting rid of VAT which is one of the most regressive tax regimes out there.
VAT is the biggest sleight of hand ever. At a stroke it removed tax from people’s pay where it was clearly visible to being hidden amongst product prices. It also moved the tax burden from the wealthy towards those who spend almost their entire pay packet on living costs. It’s a regressive tax and should be scrapped
Overly cynical.
I listened to Gove after his speech, in discussion with Seb Payne of the FT, who’s book Broken Heartlands, which deals a lot with leveling up, I’ve just finished reading.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECTWocSqClE
It’s clear to me (and it should be clear to you after watching the discussion) that Gove is fizzing with practical ideas about what leveling up is and what it isn’t. He’s also clear on the nature of the task – tidying up the High Street and/or microeconomic adjustments like in-work benefits really only alleviate symptoms and don’t address causes.
This is why Blairism failed the Regions – it’s mix of new public buildings, Surestart and mind-bogglingly complex personal tax credits ultimately did nothing sustainable. They were a 10 year sugar-rush.
Productivity improvements through better education and increased automation and quality work genuinely moving long-term out of the south-east will be the real drivers of sustainable leveling up.
Focusing on a specific point here but…
Does Her Majesty’s Government really have a “Department for Levelling Up” now? Is this really what we’ve come to as a country, ministries named after a concepts in video games rather than the austere and dignified names of the past?
If there are any budding investigative journalists out there with time on their hands, I would suggest investigating how the £4.8 Billion Levelling Up Fund (announced in the spring spending review) is being spent. The intention was to “support town centre and high street regeneration, local transport projects and cultural and heritage assets” (quote from gov.uk) which all sounds very nice. I “hear” that a lot of this money is being spent by policy wonks and city-based consultancies on drawing up environmental / sustainability / inclusivity etc. strategies for those economically deprived regions, i.e. creating lots of work for metropolitan graduates to produce some nice reports but providing little or no meaningful employment opportunities or benefits for those that actually live and work in those economically deprived areas. I know that the politicians can’t even agree amongst themselves what ‘levelling up’ is supposed to mean, but I think most people’s idea would not entail creating more jobs for metropolitan graduates. It sounds to me that the £4.8 Billion fund was set up with no idea as to how it should be spent and could be money going down the drain (or worse, being counter-productive).