Labour MPs urge Burnham to drive reindustrialisation from Manchester
More than 90 backbench Labour MPs have warned Prime Minister Andy Burnham that reindustrialisation, the effort to rebuild a country's manufacturing industry, must be driven from No 10 North in Manchester, according to a briefing paper seen by The Guardian. No 10 North is a Manchester outpost of the prime minister's Downing Street office, established in July, which has taken on some responsibility for growth policy.
The group of MPs, who sit on the government's own benches but not in the cabinet, is chaired by Andy MacNae, MP for Rossendale and Darwen. Steve Yemm, MP for Mansfield, and Lorraine Beavers, MP for Blackpool North and Fleetwood, are also members.
The paper calls on Burnham to pass a Reindustrialisation Act, a new law that would set targets for manufacturing jobs and hold ministers to account for meeting them. It also urges him to give oversight of reindustrialisation to First Secretary Louise Haigh, based at No 10 North.
The paper proposes turning the National Wealth Fund into a Reindustrialisation Development Corporation, a body that would supply capital, meaning money for investment, to rebuild UK industry. The MPs' warning, as reported by The Guardian, stops short of setting out how any of these steps would be funded.
Burnham has previously pledged that rebuilding the country's industrial capacity is central to delivering good growth in every postcode. He has also said No 10 North would help the regions with three tasks: reform of utilities, reindustrialisation and the regeneration of places. Speaking when he set out his plans, he described the Manchester office as the "nerve centre of a rewired Britain."
Burnham, the MP for Makerfield, is the former mayor of Manchester and became Labour leader in July. Reuters has reported that No 10 North will drive a decentralisation of power, moving decisions away from Westminster.
The industrial agenda is also a theme of the wider government. John Healey promised a new age of industrialisation in his Labour conference speech, ahead of his first budget.
