Real devolution puts working people at the heart of decision making

Fiscal devolution frees the hands of our metro mayors to invest in the infrastructure and local economies that can lay the path to positive reindustrialisation and good, secure job creation in all our postcodes.

And the opportunities for our corner of England are especially impactful because ours has been a relentless story of deindustrialisation, reallocated power holds the potential to reverse that trend.

But real economic revival in our industrial heartlands, truly deep-seated growth in our coastal and rural communities, and genuinely broad-based economic vibrancy in our cities and towns will not come only from relocating concentrated political power. We must change the shape of this power too.

The next steps in devolution must be about broadening the base of decision making. This is a new opportunity to make partnership, dialogue, and consensus-seeking the default approach to economic revival.

Mayors do not make decisions in a vacuum. They are supported, held to account, and tested by their combined authority boards. But at present these usually comprise of only local government leaders, leaving mayors who share a party affiliation with said leaders effectively unchallenged, and those that don’t, completely incapacitated.

If we’re serious about devolution as a route to economic revival, all mayoral boards should have to include, alongside politicians, a balance of regional industrial interests via trade union and business representatives. Only with this balance can the central mission of good growth be guaranteed in our fractured political landscape.  

Structural dialogue represents guardrails that prevent over-concentration of power, and safeguards from devolution failing to deliver consistently or delivering against the economic interests of ordinary local people.

Mayor Kim McGuinness has recognised the value of this power balance and has voluntarily embedded trade union representation throughout the North East strategic authority, from Cabinet to stakeholder engagement forums. Similar arrangements are witnessed in combined authorities in Yorkshire, ensuring that economic decisions take account of more than the bottom line for hungry investors.

And this partnership working is already paying dividends.

Decisions made in the round are rounder decisions – more inclusive, more thorough, more transformative. And the mayors who have already invited trade unionists, community representatives, and responsible business interests into their decision-making apparatus have shown this.

But these invitations have so far only been granted at the discretion of mayors who recognise the value of them, and could easily be rescinded under new leadership.

Broader representation should not be voluntary. Local decision-making must be accompanied by formal structures specifically designed to hear what local people need their economies to provide.

Further devolution is an opportunity for a new deal for the North East. One where social dialogue and inclusive growth are central, one that balances the cut and thrust of business creation with the everyday interests of ordinary working people.

Devolution is key if Burnham wants to remake Britain. But it must be delivered with working people, not merely forced upon them.