On 14 March, Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham spoke to the Alliance Party Conference in Belfast. In the speech he put forward a bold vision of a different kind of UK.
A Northern identity doesn’t always need Westminster input
Burnham began his speech by talking about how North West England and Northern Ireland had a shared identity in many ways, and that Belfast was in the words of songwriter Billy Bragg, ‘just a northern industrial town’.
Burnham suggested that both North West England and Northern Ireland had been let down by the political system in the country as it is. He then asked the audience to imagine what they could achieve together and consider what untapped potential could be freed.
Warming to the theme, Burnham then went on to suggest that while Westminster had long thought that it speaks for England, but that simply isn’t true; and how the innovative work that he and Liverpool City Region Mayor Steve Rotherham have done proved that things can be done differently, and better, away from London.
Collaboration across the Irish Sea
Mention was made of collaboration in the past between North West England and Northern Ireland in 2022, when Steve Rotherham and Burnham had come to Northern Ireland to help to establish electric buses there, and how gratifying it had been to see an electric bus in action that morning at Ballymena.
Burnham commented that there were some in Whitehall who were not happy that regions outside of the M25 were beginning to assert themselves. He talked about the common struggles facing cities such as Liverpool, Manchester, and Glasgow, along with Derry/Londonderry, and Belfast.
One example is that both North West England and Northern Ireland suffer from neglected infrastructure which they could sort out themselves, given the investment and the power to do so.
“In the UK all people and places are not equal”
Burnham also made a comparison between the struggles of those who had fought for justice over Bloody Sunday and the Hillsborough Justice campaign, making the important point that “in the UK, all people and places are not equal”.
Indeed Burnham spoke movingly of how not only had the Hillsborough families gained a lot of support from MPs in Northern Ireland, but also of a meeting in 2012 in a community centre in the Bogside when members of the Hillsborough families group met with families of the Bloody Sunday victims.
The point was also made that the Hillsborough families had passed on their advice in turn to groups like the Postmasters and Postmistresses who were wrongly accused.
I also have vivid memories of a prominent member of the Hillsborough families speaking at the Durham Miners Gala as the Orgreave Justice campaign began to build momentum in the 2010s.
What Gorton and Denton told us
Burnham then moved on to talking about the recent Gorton and Denton by-election and how it was a wake-up call. The clear gap between the electorate in east Manchester and the Westminster bubble was revealed for all to see.
Burnham also raised the point for the second time in a week, that a recent poll stating that 59% of the public had lost faith in the Westminster system for dealing with the cost of living, which should be seen as Code Red for politicians.
Practical things we could all agree on
Burnham then laid out a number of practical things people from different progressive parties could work on.
Firstly, as many parties as possible should agree to fight the next election on a platform of bringing in a proportional representation voting system and make it a manifesto commitment.
Then, there should be a commitment to further reform the House of Lords, after bringing to an end hereditary peers, Burnham suggested that a “Senate of the Nations and Regions” should be created, which would represent the regions and nations of the UK and would be based on the percentage of votes parties got in a General Election, and this would give a real voice to people and places that at present don’t get their voices heard fully.
There should be reforms to the Whip System, so that elected representatives can truly represent their constituents and he is in favour of the establishment of a written constitution, so that no citizen of the UK, wherever they may live, can be treated again as a second-class citizen.
Finally he feels that all regions and nations of the UK should get the maximum amount of power and funding that they might be eligible for under a devolved system.
What is needed is a political system where the petty point scoring is removed and is replaced by long-term investment in all our regions and nations.
Burnham finished by issuing a rallying cry for a new politics and a new economics.
“We must make politics work for people again – and I am here today in the hope that mission will become our common cause.”
A vision of something better
In sharp contrast to the lack of vision displayed by the Labour government, this was a visionary speech. It provided a blueprint with real solutions to some of our most deep rooted problems.
If Burnham should ever be allowed to stand for Labour as an MP again and he gets elected, he may well rise to the position of Prime Minister, and this gives us a glimpse of a better, fairer, and more hopeful future for Northern England, Northern Ireland and indeed the whole of the UK.
The speech can be read in full here.
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