Andy Burnham has set out a radical political and economic blueprint for Britain aimed at ending what he terms decades of trickle-down economics, drawing inspiration from regional devolution models found across Europe, according to coverage from The Independent and The Guardian.
Devolution and the ‘Manchesterism’ Agenda
According to The Independent, the former Greater Manchester mayor aims to make his premiership a circuit breaker for Britain through the largest rebalancing of power the country has ever seen. Rooting decision-making in communities rather than centrally in London, the administration intends to follow a “Makerfield test” to measure policy success by its impact on forgotten constituencies. This business-friendly socialist policy agenda, dubbed ‘Manchesterism’, combines plans to give all mayors of England’s city regions a share of income tax revenue with efforts to retake public control of essential services.
The Guardian reports that Burnham launched this vision during a speech at the People’s History Museum in Manchester, promising good growth in every postcode. Britain remains the most centralised G7 country for tax and spending policy, and among the most economically unequal in the developed world. To counter this, plans include establishing a new No 10 hub in the north based in Manchester, granting sweeping devolved powers over tax, skills, and industry by default, and introducing a German-style Basic Law to guarantee equal living standards, an idea previously mooted in Burnham’s book Head North.
Lessons From Bilbao’s Economic Transformation
To find a precedent for how this approach might succeed, The Independent notes that observers look 700 miles away to Bilbao in Northern Spain’s Basque Country. Ivan Jiménez, president of the Port of Bilbao, told The Independent that the industrial port city suffered severe deindustrialisation in the 1980s, facing shipyard closures, factory shutdowns, and a 25 percent unemployment rate reminiscent of Liverpool and other English industrial centres.
However, Bilbao’s GDP more than doubled between the opening of the Guggenheim Museum in 1997 and 2015, pivoting from steel and shipbuilding toward clean energy, advanced manufacturing, biotechnology, tourism, and culture. Jiménez attributes much of this economic growth—which outpaced the rest of Spain between 2000 and 2018—to sweeping regional self-governance. Under the Basque Country’s autonomous community, the region collects 100 percent of its own income tax through its three provinces, keeping the majority and sending a fixed annual quota to Madrid for national services like the military.
Reforming Westminster, Whitehall, and Economic Policy
According to The Guardian, Burnham has also criticized Westminster and Whitehall as drags on national growth, describing Parliament as fragmented and disjointed. Diverging from Keir Starmer’s strict whip system, Burnham pledged to empower backbenchers to change things locally without using fear to close down debate. He additionally suggested ending the adversarial system within the civil service, specifically addressing friction between government departments and the Treasury.
On economic policy, Burnham’s rejection of the old trickle-down model aligns broadly with Chancellor Rachel Reeves, who argued in her first party conference speech that trickle-down economics is over, as reported by The Guardian. Where Burnham diverges is in the breadth of his state intervention, proposing an expanded role for the government in running essential services, housing, and industrial strategy.
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