Devolution has proved a revolutionary, if controversial, development that has defined the current period of Conservative Party rule in the North. Under the steam of Boris Johnson and Michael Gove, the Tories have lent into devolution, both as a lever to ‘levelling up’ and as a potential solution to the ‘problem’ of the North and …
I vividly remember, shortly after I was elected Leader of Newcastle City Council in 2011, a political friend asking me why on earth I’d chosen to ruin my career by taking on such a poisoned chalice. The then Chancellor George Osborne and Eric Pickles (the then Secretary of State for Local Government) were proposing deep …
So here we go again. A moment of stupidity coming back to bite a politician on the bum. The bum in question this time belongs to Kim McGuinness, a well-regarded figure in the Labour Party who hopes to be elected as the first North East Regional Mayor and who currently serves as Northumbria Police and …
Last week Arts Council England issued new guidance on how to manage the risks to reputation of ‘political activity’. This resulted into a bit of a brouhaha around perceptions of censorship of the 985 cultural organisations they fund. What’s going on in that row? Arts Council maintain they wrote the guidance to help boards and …
The old French proverb ‘the more things change, the more they remain the same’ can be applied to many things, particularly in the world of politics — but seldom does it ring more true than in the case of the North-South divide. Over the course of the last 30 years, governments of various persuasions have …
In the North East, we obsess over government spending, especially with power coming to the new Mayor. And we trumpet new investment by businesses, tracking data for any bright spots of prosperity. But what role should philanthropy play? This would already be a very different place if not for giving of money, time and expertise. …
You only have to venture out into the communities around you to see deepening poverty. Rising homelessness, community buildings turned into “warm spaces” for people who can’t afford to heat their homes, growing numbers of people being treated by the NHS for malnutrition, queues at food banks. Shockingly, the latest data shows more than one …
When Brian Aitken kindly invited me to write an occasional column for The QT, I naturally started to think about what subjects I should write about. He told me about the issues and features The QT would focus on, things that are often not covered by the traditional media whose online coverage is dictated by …
The terms “civilised” and “society” were always contested. As forged in fiery furnaces of early modern newspapers, “civilised society” usually meant white, upper middle-class and aristocratic conservative men. They were utterly convinced of the rationality of their social position and very invested in keeping it. You might find the odd remnant lurking like decaying Victorian …
As the race for the regional mayoralties in Tees Valley and the North East hots up, it would be easy to forget the very existence of the 12 local councils that will continue to sit alongside them. It’s a paradox that while so much political energy is being invested in new regional tiers of governance, …
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