Nandy pledge to revitalise investment in the North

ONLY Greece receives less investment than the North of England, a study of Western economies has found.

The IPPR think-tank said if the region were a country, Greece would be the only nation in the Organisation for Economic and Co-operation and Development to see less investment.

The UK as a whole ranks 35th among the 38 OECD countries in terms of receiving the least support, according to the State of the North report.

Slovakia, Poland and Hungary all enjoy more investment than the UK.

It came as Lisa Nandy, the shadow levelling-up secretary, called on local authority leaders to say which powers they would like to see handed to them to reinvigorate the North’s economy.

She will tell the Convention of the North today that Labour would carry out its commitment to hand over powers in policy areas including housing, energy, childcare, buses, trains, skills, training and employment.

The Wigan MP will say the way the country is governed “must change” or Britain’s future could be at risk.

In its report, the IPPR said that were the OECD average applied to the UK for 2017 to 2020, some £397 billion more would have been invested.

The IPPR said the UK and the North were being held back by “vast inequalities” and “systematic underinvestment” in research and development, social infrastructure and transport.

The report highlights the extent of regional disparities, including that productivity is around £7 lower per hour worked in the North than the England average, and hourly pay is £1.60 lower than in the rest of England.

Marcus Johns, report author and IPPR North research fellow, said: “Of all the advanced economies, ours is the most regionally divided – the North is at the sharp end of these divides.”

The report also points to other places that have turned their economies around, such as Leipzig in Germany.