Sunak pumps more money into South

PM takes different approach to awarding levelling up cash from Johnson, analysis shows

RISHI SUNAK has directed more levelling up money to the South East and South West than his predecessor Boris Johnson, analysis by The Daily Telegraph shows.

The Prime Minister will today say which projects will benefit from the second round of the Government’s Levelling Up Fund, with 111 bids benefiting from a share of almost £2.1billion.

But a comparison of the first round of payouts from the fund, which took place under Mr Johnson, and the second round shows that the two leaders have taken subtly different approaches.

The share of the money going to Yorkshire and the Humber dropped from 11 per cent to 5.8 per cent between the first and second rounds. The North East’s share fell from 5.9 per cent to 5.2 per cent.

These areas are where many of the Tories’ Red Wall seats are found – Labour strongholds that were won in the 2019 general election.

Meanwhile, the share for the South East rose by 8.9 per cent to 10.1 per cent between rounds, while the South West share increased from 7.7 per cent to 8.9 per cent. These areas are traditional Tory heartlands.

During the summer Tory leadership election, Mr Sunak faced a backlash after leaked audio showed him talking about changing funding approaches in Tunbridge Wells, Kent.

He said: “We inherited a bunch of formulas from Labour that shoved all the funding into deprived urban areas and that needed to be undone. I started the work of undoing that.”

The funding remains a complicated picture as every region in England has received a nine-figure sum in the latest round of announcements. The North West had the biggest share in both rounds – rising from 13.7 per cent in round one to 17 per cent in round two, giving it an allocation of £354million.

Today’s second round also represents a bigger pot of money from the Government, rising to £2.1billion from the £1.7billion announced in October 2021.

Mr Sunak’s own constituency of Richmond, in North Yorkshire, will benefit from £19 million towards a district council regeneration project.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer’s constituency of Holborn and St Pancras has also received cash, in the form of £7.7million for the north London borough of Camden – as does that of Lisa Nandy, the shadow levelling up secretary, with £20million for Wigan.

Across the UK a total of £672 million will go towards better transport links, £821million towards community regeneration and £594million for the restoration of heritage sites.

Mr Sunak said: “Through greater investment in local areas, we can grow the economy, create good jobs and spread opportunity everywhere.

“By reaching even more parts of the country than before, we will build a future of optimism and pride in people’s lives and the places they call home.”

But Ms Nandy claimed the fund was “in chaos, beset by delays and allegations of favouritism”.

“It is time to end this Hunger Gamesstyle contest where communities are pitted against one another and Whitehall ministers pick winners and losers,” she said.

sir – Rishi Sunak is right to turn his back on the World Economic Forum’s Davos schmoozefest (report, January 18). The transparent hypocrisy of the eager participants in Klaus Schwab’s annual event, mostly at their shareholders’ or taxpayers’ expense, is obvious to all except themselves. This year’s meaningless theme is “cooperation in a fragmented world”.

A while back they were all over blockchain, a financial chimera that unleashed some of the biggest frauds ever seen. Doubtless there are more to come. Then they prostrated themselves like naughty children at the feet of a Swedish schoolgirl, who lectured them on their responsibility for the so-called climate emergency, before taking their leave in their luxury limousines to return to their private jets.

Doubtless they will have paused to condemn the mendacity and disregard for human life of Qatar and Fifa, although this won’t have stopped them enjoying the World Cup sporting spectacle to the full. What will it be next? Tulips? The South Seas? Their hypocrisy has no limits, save one: don’t upset China, irrespective of President Xi’s tyranny and thuggish bullying. And don’t mention its role in the Covid pandemic, however strong the evidence.

These Davos Men exist in a miasma of hypocrisy and denial, yet still they thrive. One asks oneself how the World Economic Forum can continue to defy these realities.

Sir Andrew Cook

Castagnola, Ticino, Switzerland