Manchester and surrounding communities led from the front in the heat of the Industrial Revolution. With new investment in transport connectivity, set out this week by the Prime Minister, it can lead the post-industrial revolution, too, and become what Manchester City Council’s Sir Howard Bernstein calls “a destination of choice for investors”. It should also be a destination of choice for career-seekers, tourists, audiences, and many more.
Under Government plans for a Northern Powerhouse, it is positive to see a growing willingness to transfer more power to our big cities, and invest at considerable scale of ambition in our Northern transport infrastructure. But this should now be matched by enthusiasm among local authorities not just to take the powers, but to pool them – and their existing competences and budgets – in collaborative local partnerships with strong leadership.
The recent achievements at Alderley Park’s new science park show what can be achieved when “city” and “county” work in common cause to strengthen the local economy. In early 2013 the prospects for the vast site looked dire, as AstraZeneca announced plans to migrate thousands of research and development staff to Cambridge. Now, at the end of 2014, the site has a new owner: Manchester Science Parks – and hundreds of new jobs are being created. This would not have been possible without the close collaboration of Cheshire East Council, Manchester City Council and the University of Manchester. It is a powerful case study of collaborative partnerships in action.
Success breeds success. This model of partnership has now inspired wider collaboration between the Greater Manchester and Cheshire & Warrington Local Enterprise Partnerships in plans to create a Science Corridor in the area. It is an ambition that will see many more jobs created and businesses started and expanded, as the strengths of our science skills base are more fully realised from Liverpool to Manchester and on to Macclesfield in north-east Cheshire. Securing £20 million Growth Deal funding earlier in the year is a promising start to this vital initiative.
To be a destination of choice the North needs more than a transfer of powers, it needs to be an interconnected place that people can easily get to and get around. London, after all, is a powerhouse conurbation of historic towns and villages from Uxbridge to Upminster and beyond. But, notoriously, it currently takes longer to get from Liverpool to Hull than from London to Paris. In response, the Government has put forward a number of positive infrastructure initiatives, if local partners agree: from big new transpennine high-speed rail projects, to overdue rail electrification on existing lines and much more localised regeneration. A Northern Hub for transport connections, centred on Manchester, is another vital component.
When the Chancellor, George Osborne, first set out his compelling vision of a Northern Powerhouse, he rightly did so at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester – a museum that shows how the North led scientific innovation and industrial progress. Sadly, too many visitors to our country learn about our national scientific heritage at the Science Museum in non-industrial South Kensington. We need to compete directly with London and match its success. This doesn’t mean copying what it does or doing what it says. It means empowering local partnerships here in the North – as the Government is seeking to do – to take forward the initiatives needed to become the Powerhouse we have the potential to become.