Thread by @TorstenBell

What marks out this levelling up agenda piece from @racheljanetwolf is:
- it has an actual agenda
- it's an argument for the Tories becoming French (specifically the 20th Century French right) ie focusing on liveability of places not their productivity conservativehome.com/platform/2021/…

I basically support a lot of what's in here. Liveability should be prioritised. The real trick is to combine it with sorting out our second cities productivity disasters too

That's what gives you the chance of ecosystem change for regional economies. The politics is towns vs cities but the economics is the opposite.

We also all need to stop talking as if we are America. England has a huge huge advantage when it comes to these economic geography challenges: we are really really small

Two dangers with this agenda (a version of which is in practice what the govt will do)

Political danger: it requires more spending - and the Chancellor doesn’t want to put up taxes more or take the pressure off Labour by saying borrowing is fine

Economic danger: the UK is already engaging in relative economic decline that is hammering our living standards. Focusing on ‘liveability’ to the exclusion of answering difficult questions on how we compete in the world risks doubling down on that. The task is to do both