Brexit to give people power under Labour

This week I will sit down with Gordon Brown to discuss creating a Labour policy for the first time in 10 years.

Back then we were in government. Now our party has spent seven years in opposition.

But this policy could help Labour back to power.

Gordon and I will meet Labour leaders from across the country in Cardiff. Our aim is to discuss a new UK federal framework of nations and regions.

Brexit will present us with enormous financial challenges. But it also gives us a golden opportunity to make a fairer distribution of resources, powers and accountability in the most centralised country in Europe.

Labour has a great record on making power more locally accountable. We introduced the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the London Mayor.

Leaving the EU will transfer billions of pounds of resources and powers back to the UK – but we must get it right.

A Labour government’s Northern plan, called the Northern Way, delivered

Regional Development Agencies for the North West, Yorkshire and the Humber, and the North East – an area with more people than Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland combined.

They were dedicated to reducing the growing inequality between the North and South. But the Tories scrapped them and introduced the Northern Powerhouse, which wasn’t really Northern and had little power!

This North/South economic, political and social inequality requires constitutional change.

So I am delighted to be part of a group led by Gordon Brown and Jon Trickett to work out how we can really give more power to the people.

I popped to the cinema last week and saw the first film I could. I had no idea what Fifty Shades Darker was but I now see why it wasn’t nominated for an Oscar. I certainly won’t recommend it to Pauline. She’s more

M&S than S&M!

POLICY John and Gordon Brown