Northern Powerhouse? Unlikely if this is true.

[jjb1970]

North - South debates always amuse me. What is the North? I am from Cumbria, growing up in Cumbria very few people around me felt any affinity or displayed much interest in Lancashire, much less for Yorkshire. There was some affinity for Newcastle and Northumberland (Newcastle was the 'big city' for us) but even then people didn't consider themselves to be part of the Northeast. Going to college and later university in the Northeast I can't remember meeting anyone who had any affinity with the Northwest other than some shared affinity for the places along Hadrian's Wall. People talk about 'the North' as some sort of homogenous entity when it isn't. People from the North often whinge about 'the South' and want to believe people South of wherever their conception of the North ends (for me growing up, that would have been Lancaster, others reach much further South) have no interest or knowledge of the Northern parts of the country. There's some truth in that, it's equally true that many people from the North have very little knowledge or interest in 'the South' and often ignore the idea that there might be a 'West' and an 'East'. 

[rockershovel]

On 20/11/2021 at 09:51, whart57 said:

 

You haven't noticed then that the fracking companies are looking at their financial prospects and deciding the game isn't worth the candle. Like so much recently, government support for fracking was for petty political reasons - like your "face down the greenies" - and not on cold analysis. Government friendly media dutifully reported the press releases that claimed we were floating on gas, what they didn't report was that it wasn't economically recoverable unless gas prices went a lot higher than they are now.

 

If we want gas for homes, or to power vehicles, then that gas is hydrogen. Green hydrogen produced when renewable electricity generation is outstripping demand, not blue hydrogen produced from fossil fuels with a non-existent carbon capture bit put on to make the press release look better.

 

Those greenies understand the issues a lot better than you do.

Fracking as presented by the press and political factions of the UK was always about a company called Cuadrilla; a second or third tier operating company whose CEO was that long-time "golden boy" of the Conservative Party, Lord Browne. 

 

The US sector is essentially about second and third tier operators and speculators jumping on the Horizontal Directional Drilling bandwagon, which made it technically and economically feasible to drill Wells in these strata. 

 

It was almost stillborn, but a key breakthrough (one of the "step changes" which the hydrocarbon sector produces) meant that Wells could produce oil; at very low recovery percentages, for limited periods but in the small scale economics of the sector, some individuals became rich and a fairly minor play known as the Bakken came into prominence.

 

Pretty much nothing about the green  renewable sector bears any real scrutiny andfracking isn't much better 

[Hal Nail]

10 hours ago, Mike Storey said:

I just don't understand the voters, but perhaps I am completely thick.

I get the impression the average voter these days (not forgetting a massive number dont even bother) holds the government to account for absolutely everything and wants to be better off in the short term. And thats as far as the thinking (using the word loosely) goes.

 

I'm not quite sure why anyone would want to be prime minister now, when we are going into a recession which they cant control but thats another story.

 

As to north south, people are tribal. If anyone did bother to even things up we'd just find someome else to dislike. One thing we are actually quite good at!

[Michael Hodgson]

4 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

North - South debates always amuse me. What is the North? I am from Cumbria, growing up in Cumbria very few people around me felt any affinity or displayed much interest in Lancashire, much less for Yorkshire.

That's the wrong question.  What matter is not where is the border between the North and South, but rather where do the Midlands start and finish. 

 

I was born in the New Forest so it's not unreasonable to call me a Southerner.  I have been called Welsh, probably because of my Welsh-sounding middle name - which happens to my grandmother's maiden name - she had Irish ancestry but spoke with a very strong Edinburgh accent despite living in Newcastle for most of her 80 years!  But amongst other places I lived in Northumberland and went to a school on Hadrian's Wall,  where the people consider "them Durham lot" to be Southerners, and logically I suppose that should also apply to Cumberland and Westmorland too.

 

Most people from "South of the River" consider Watford to be in the North, a town they think must be a long way past London because it takes ages to reach Watford Gap motorway services.  I currently live in North Herts and that's obviously officially in the North because it's good few miles beyond signs to "Hatfield and the North".  However the broadcasting authorities seem to think I must be in the East of England because our TV programmes come from Norfolk.  But I maybe we ought to be classed as in the Midlands, since I can get to Coventry in half the time it takes to get to Norwich.

 

As for the West, that heads off towards the Scillies beginning from around Bristol , but doesn't extend very far north of there because you hit the Midlands next.  There isn't really an East-West divide beyond the Midlands, as it's simply the good old War of the Roses where the county boundaries matter.

 

 

[DY444]

11 hours ago, Mike Storey said:

But, on another point, isn't Northern Powerhouse dead as a concept?

 

There were a number of opportunities for the electorate to vote for Regional Government, certainly under Cameron, but they rejected it. A few Mayors were created, often in the face of opposition. I note Liverpool has just decided to get rid of theirs, despite a referendum. Apparently the successes of Greater Manchester and the West Midlands do not apply there. Transport for the North was meant to be the opportunity for all northern areas to get together and formulate a single policy, but the DfT, and, presumably, the Cabinet and Treasury, simply ignored it in the end. Perhaps that is why so many of the electorate voted instead for the concept of Levelling Up, where a few civil servants and MP's in Westminster decides what few millions you get, if any, rather than some local representatives. I just don't understand the voters, but perhaps I am completely thick.

 

My perception as a distant dispassionate observer is that TfN operated rather too far towards the crayons and fantasy end of the spectrum and not enough towards the art of the possible end.  And unlike TfL, which broadly pulls in the same direction most of the time, the geographical distribution and different aspirations of different areas make it less easy to gain a consensus.  If you satisfy say Leeds and Manchester then you upset Bradford and Sheffield kind of thing.  Throw in a number of occasions when it was clear TfN didn't really understand railways and them being sidelined didn't come as a great shock. 

 

As for local representatives deciding how to play things, yes that often works well, sometimes however it does not.  Merseyside is experiencing that now with the class 777s where you have the Mayor playing political games by simultaneously backing Mersey Travel's operational plan and the RMT which opposes it.  Result equals delay in service entry, dozens of new trains standing idle, and the need to thrash out a new operating model which will cost far more than the original one and result in higher fares or higher council taxes or both.  

[DavidLong]

12 hours ago, Mike Storey said:

But, on another point, isn't Northern Powerhouse dead as a concept?

 

There were a number of opportunities for the electorate to vote for Regional Government, certainly under Cameron, but they rejected it. A few Mayors were created, often in the face of opposition. I note Liverpool has just decided to get rid of theirs, despite a referendum. Apparently the successes of Greater Manchester and the West Midlands do not apply there. Transport for the North was meant to be the opportunity for all northern areas to get together and formulate a single policy, but the DfT, and, presumably, the Cabinet and Treasury, simply ignored it in the end. Perhaps that is why so many of the electorate voted instead for the concept of Levelling Up, where a few civil servants and MP's in Westminster decides what few millions you get, if any, rather than some local representatives. I just don't understand the voters, but perhaps I am completely thick.

 

 

Steve Rotheram, the mayor of the Merseyside Combined Authority is still in place. He is the equivalent of Andy Burnham (GMCA) and Andy Street (WMCA). The mayoral changes on Merseyside involve only the City of Liverpool and I'm still not sure that I understand them!

 

David

[rockershovel]

TfL mostly pulls in broadly the same direction because its overall geography and infrastructure were established organically, long ago. Most of the "new" ideas (like Cross Rail) have been under detailed development for many decades and metastasis took place long ago. 

[rockershovel]

1 hour ago, Michael Hodgson said:

That's the wrong question.  What matter is not where is the border between the North and South, but rather where do the Midlands start and finish. 

 

I was born in the New Forest so it's not unreasonable to call me a Southerner.  I have been called Welsh, probably because of my Welsh-sounding middle name - which happens to my grandmother's maiden name - she had Irish ancestry but spoke with a very strong Edinburgh accent despite living in Newcastle for most of her 80 years!  But amongst other places I lived in Northumberland and went to a school on Hadrian's Wall,  where the people consider "them Durham lot" to be Southerners, and logically I suppose that should also apply to Cumberland and Westmorland too.

 

Most people from "South of the River" consider Watford to be in the North, a town they think must be a long way past London because it takes ages to reach Watford Gap motorway services.  I currently live in North Herts and that's obviously officially in the North because it's good few miles beyond signs to "Hatfield and the North".  However the broadcasting authorities seem to think I must be in the East of England because our TV programmes come from Norfolk.  But I maybe we ought to be classed as in the Midlands, since I can get to Coventry in half the time it takes to get to Norwich.

 

As for the West, that heads off towards the Scillies beginning from around Bristol , but doesn't extend very far north of there because you hit the Midlands next.  There isn't really an East-West divide beyond the Midlands, as it's simply the good old War of the Roses where the county boundaries matter.

 

 

It's remarkable, considering the major constitutional issues involved and the actual outcome that there is so little understanding of the 2004 Regional Devolution Referendum. 

 

Labour passed the enabling legislation in 2003, and the first of three votes  took place in 2004 as an all-postal ballot in the NE of England. The question was whether voters supported the introduction of Regional Devolved Assemblies. These made little sense in English constitutional terms, but they are easily understandable in terms of the EU Committee for Regions (most European countries have structures of this nature, after all).

 

The Regional Authorities have boundaries much as described by the EU CoR. 

 

However the first vote (in the NE) resulted in a heavy defeat for the proposed authority; it came very close to that rare thing in English politics, an overall majority vote. The subsequent votes (NW and Yorks N of the Humber) were immediately cancelled.

 

This whole episode is largely unknown in the country as a whole, but it is widely documented and quite unambiguous in its conclusion. 

 

 

[62613]

15 hours ago, Mike Storey said:

But, on another point, isn't Northern Powerhouse dead as a concept?

 

There were a number of opportunities for the electorate to vote for Regional Government, certainly under Cameron, but they rejected it. A few Mayors were created, often in the face of opposition. I note Liverpool has just decided to get rid of theirs, despite a referendum. Apparently the successes of Greater Manchester and the West Midlands do not apply there. Transport for the North was meant to be the opportunity for all northern areas to get together and formulate a single policy, but the DfT, and, presumably, the Cabinet and Treasury, simply ignored it in the end. Perhaps that is why so many of the electorate voted instead for the concept of Levelling Up, where a few civil servants and MP's in Westminster decides what few millions you get, if any, rather than some local representatives. I just don't understand the voters, but perhaps I am completely thick.

 

The city mayor, not the regional one, I think.

[Mike Storey]

6 hours ago, DY444 said:

 

My perception as a distant dispassionate observer is that TfN operated rather too far towards the crayons and fantasy end of the spectrum and not enough towards the art of the possible end.  And unlike TfL, which broadly pulls in the same direction most of the time, the geographical distribution and different aspirations of different areas make it less easy to gain a consensus.  If you satisfy say Leeds and Manchester then you upset Bradford and Sheffield kind of thing.  Throw in a number of occasions when it was clear TfN didn't really understand railways and them being sidelined didn't come as a great shock. 

 

As for local representatives deciding how to play things, yes that often works well, sometimes however it does not.  Merseyside is experiencing that now with the class 777s where you have the Mayor playing political games by simultaneously backing Mersey Travel's operational plan and the RMT which opposes it.  Result equals delay in service entry, dozens of new trains standing idle, and the need to thrash out a new operating model which will cost far more than the original one and result in higher fares or higher council taxes or both.  

 

Whatever the opinion of their recommendations (and there are aspects to be applauded as well as criticised), it is an absolute fact that TfN DID reach consensus across all members over that plan. That was described as a phenomenal achievement by several commentators at the time. Thus, I do not understand your comment.

 

Merseyrail and the RMT have reached agreement (announced on 9 July), which merely perpetuate the existing costs, not "far more" - originally, the staff were to be re-utilised anyway, but not in the form of a guaranteed second person on the train (which is what the public wanted as much as the union). The "delays" are nothing to do with the industrial dispute, but due to continuing technical problems with the 777 fleet, identified in testing, and with delays to the platform and signalling upgrades, planned to have been finished by now, due to Covid. It appears, from various sources, that introduction into public service is unlikely until the end of this year. Again, I do not fully understand your comment.

 

[31A]

To my mind one of the saddest things about the establishment of TfN is that it seems to have caused the demise of the PTEs.

 

Having dealt with both the Yorkshire ones professionally, they seemed to be a force for good and instrumental in actually getting things done in terms of improvements for rail and transport generally.  Also, they were in a position (because of the way the franchises were set up) to "hold to account" the TOCs in a way which nobody seems to be doing at the moment, e.g. Northern's drastic timetabled service reductions which in some cases seem to have scant regard for the demands of a sensible service pattern, and Trans Pennine's random and unpredictable cancellations which have been going on over a long period of time now, but nobody seems to be interested in resolving.

 

Speaking as a retired person I no longer have an inside view, but it appears that TfN doesn't have the same sort of clout.  I would like to be proved wrong, but as a (now) outsider I'm afraid that's the way it seems to me.

 

[Mike Storey]

4 hours ago, 31A said:

To my mind one of the saddest things about the establishment of TfN is that it seems to have caused the demise of the PTEs.

 

Having dealt with both the Yorkshire ones professionally, they seemed to be a force for good and instrumental in actually getting things done in terms of improvements for rail and transport generally.  Also, they were in a position (because of the way the franchises were set up) to "hold to account" the TOCs in a way which nobody seems to be doing at the moment, e.g. Northern's drastic timetabled service reductions which in some cases seem to have scant regard for the demands of a sensible service pattern, and Trans Pennine's random and unpredictable cancellations which have been going on over a long period of time now, but nobody seems to be interested in resolving.

 

Speaking as a retired person I no longer have an inside view, but it appears that TfN doesn't have the same sort of clout.  I would like to be proved wrong, but as a (now) outsider I'm afraid that's the way it seems to me.

 

 

Perhaps the two issues are entirely coincidental?

 

TfN had next to no responsibilities for operational or commercial management, so it is unlikely their existence reduced the influence of PTE's. More likely, is the transfer of franchises to management contracts. Whilst the DfT deny this has in any way reduced the influence of PTE's on the TOC's, in reality, all commercial decisions have to be ratified, or ordered, by Westminster (IIRC), which in turn affects operational decisions, because they now control all the purse-strings.

 

[31A]

39 minutes ago, Mike Storey said:

 

Perhaps the two issues are entirely coincidental?

 

TfN had next to no responsibilities for operational or commercial management, so it is unlikely their existence reduced the influence of PTE's. More likely, is the transfer of franchises to management contracts. Whilst the DfT deny this has in any way reduced the influence of PTE's on the TOC's, in reality, all commercial decisions have to be ratified, or ordered, by Westminster (IIRC), which in turn affects operational decisions, because they now control all the purse-strings.

 

 

Yes maybe.  I must admit I thought the PTEs had been abolished but while the West Yorkshire one has (in name at any rate):

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Yorkshire_Metro

 

 it seems the South Yorkshire one still exists:

 

https://sypte.co.uk/WhoWeAre/OurRole

 

[Mike Storey]

Just spotted this (which is claimed to be "old news" for both candidates), but I wonder if they really mean it?

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/28/liz-truss-promises-to-build-northern-powerhouse-rail-scaled-back-last-year

 

 

[billbedford]

I wouldn't trust Liz Truss not to route the Liverpool-Leeds line via Oslo. 

[rockershovel]

Were I a cynical soul (which Heaven forfend) I'd be invited to ponder on the thought that the original industrial prosperity of the North was based upon local industrialists using locally available materials, like coal, water and iron, to produce manufactured goods. 

 

The canals developed to serve this trade and the railways developed to displace the canals

 

I don't recall government policy being part of this? 

[admiles]

23 hours ago, Mike Storey said:

Just spotted this (which is claimed to be "old news" for both candidates), but I wonder if they really mean it?

 

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2022/jul/28/liz-truss-promises-to-build-northern-powerhouse-rail-scaled-back-last-year

 

 

 

Does anyone actually believe a single word that falls from the mouths of politicians looking to get elected? 

[billbedford]

11 hours ago, rockershovel said:

Were I a cynical soul (which Heaven forfend) I'd be invited to ponder on the thought that the original industrial prosperity of the North was based upon local industrialists using locally available materials, like coal, water and iron, to produce manufactured goods. 

 

..and, of course, cotton. 

 

11 hours ago, rockershovel said:

I don't recall government policy being part of this? 

 

Just the opposite. Most of the early industrialist were non-conformists and therefore outside national politics, education and more often than not the banking system. 

[mdvle]

13 hours ago, rockershovel said:

Were I a cynical soul (which Heaven forfend) I'd be invited to ponder on the thought that the original industrial prosperity of the North was based upon local industrialists using locally available materials, like coal, water and iron, to produce manufactured goods. 

 

The canals developed to serve this trade and the railways developed to displace the canals

 

I don't recall government policy being part of this? 

 

We also live in a very different world here 100+ years on from then.

 

The world you describe was a world when the UK was a global empire exploiting its foreign holdings, something that no longer exists.

 

Transportation is something that in most places is one way or another subsidized by governments of various levels - whether it be the roads that decimated the movement of goods by train or the inherently money losing passenger rail systems that remain after the profit making goods moved to government funded roads.

 

As for manufacturing, when done in the west, tends to be stuff that benefits from automation and robotics - hence limited number of workers being employed.  We have moved on to employment that requires higher levels of education than 100 years ago - which again involves the government as a funder.

 

So whether one views it as good or bad government policy and funding is now generally necessary for any area to thrive (or alternately stagnate if deprived of said funding).  Don't get upgraded roads or railways and you aren't attractive - either for existing businesses, educated employees, and entrepreneurs.

[62613]

On 27/07/2022 at 02:28, jjb1970 said:

North - South debates always amuse me. What is the North? I am from Cumbria, growing up in Cumbria very few people around me felt any affinity or displayed much interest in Lancashire, much less for Yorkshire. There was some affinity for Newcastle and Northumberland (Newcastle was the 'big city' for us) but even then people didn't consider themselves to be part of the Northeast. Going to college and later university in the Northeast I can't remember meeting anyone who had any affinity with the Northwest other than some shared affinity for the places along Hadrian's Wall. People talk about 'the North' as some sort of homogenous entity when it isn't. People from the North often whinge about 'the South' and want to believe people South of wherever their conception of the North ends (for me growing up, that would have been Lancaster, others reach much further South) have no interest or knowledge of the Northern parts of the country. There's some truth in that, it's equally true that many people from the North have very little knowledge or interest in 'the South' and often ignore the idea that there might be a 'West' and an 'East'. 

OK, let's redefine; I think most people think only of "The North" when they talk about deprived areas, perhaps forgetting that the South - West  of England, parts of Wales and parts of the East Midlands, also haven't done well at all for years. My definition of "South" would be the area enclosed inside a line, roughly, North Sea/Peterborough/Milton Keynes/Oxford/Swindon/Southampton. The area inside this line has prospered mightily, whereas thos area outside of it haven't to a large degree.

 

It might be worth noting that politicians have been advocating abandoning the old heavy industrial areas since the 1930s, as too far gone to rescue, and concentrating resources within the area definined by my arbitrary line.

 

[62613]

On 29/07/2022 at 11:01, rockershovel said:

Were I a cynical soul (which Heaven forfend) I'd be invited to ponder on the thought that the original industrial prosperity of the North was based upon local industrialists using locally available materials, like coal, water and iron, to produce manufactured goods. 

 

The canals developed to serve this trade and the railways developed to displace the canals

 

I don't recall government policy being part of this? 

Yes, but private capital was easy to obtain in Britain then; from the end of the 18th century, if not earlier, there was untold wealth flowing back to the mother country, first from the American Colonies, and then from India. Those with the money needed to do something with it to make more. A large part of the financial system was in the hands of The Quakers (see the Pease family of Darlington). After the end of the Great War, sources of private capital seemed to dry up; only government, with its seemingly infinite resources, had the ability to pay for, or guarantee, the investment required to keep Britain going. It's what's happening now with stuff like HS2 and if it ever happens, Northern Powerhouse Rail. My opinion

[jjb1970]

22 minutes ago, 62613 said:

OK, let's redefine; I think most people think only of "The North" when they talk about deprived areas, perhaps forgetting that the South - West  of England, parts of Wales and parts of the East Midlands, also haven't done well at all for years. My definition of "South" would be the area enclosed inside a line, roughly, North Sea/Peterborough/Milton Keynes/Oxford/Swindon/Southampton. The area inside this line has prospered mightily, whereas thos area outside of it haven't to a large degree.

 

It might be worth noting that politicians have been advocating abandoning the old heavy industrial areas since the 1930s, as too far gone to rescue, and concentrating resources within the area definined by my arbitrary line.

 

 

I lived in Milton Keynes for 12 years or so and there are some troubled areas of Milton Keynes which are very deprived. Similarly having worked in London and Southampton in that time I'm familiar with some of the social issues of those cities. Southampton has a lot of social issues linked to economic hardship. Conversely there's no shortage of affluence and wealth in Northern areas, it's not all a post-industrial wasteland. Which is why these divisions don't really work as they assume we can package the country into a rich half of winners and a poor half of losers when reality is nothing like as simple. I had a higher standard of living in Cumbria than we had down South for the first few years as my salary was basically the same but I had a massively higher mortgage and commuting expenses. 

[lanchester]

Couple of observations.

 

Firstly, if you actually orient a map of the UK by true North, instead of leaning it over a bit to try and get Orkney and maybe Shetland onto an A4 sheet, the 'divide' looks much more like West-East, so including eg Cornwall, Wales etc, but also acknowledging that the East side of eg Yorkshire, Northumberland, Scotland tend to be, relatively, more prosperous than the west.

 

Second, this is mostly geology. It's no coincidence that when the Romans came in 43AD, initially they called a halt round about the Fosse Way/ A46, a line roughly Exeter to Lincoln. That bagged them all the good arable land (and of course tribes that were through trade already a bit 'romanised' and so fairly happy to cut a deal. Sadly, the Romans didn't always spell out the small print, hence the Iceni, Boudicca, and other unpleasantnesses). Advances further north and west were partly in pursuit of metals and similar geological resources - although they really didn't have to as the Brits only now had one market; and of course generals and emperors believing, perhaps rightly in the short to medium term, that the Empire could only survive through continuing expansion. Hadrian, the wall chappy, recognised that this wasn't sustainable (and after a wobble by Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius came to much the same conclusion).

 

But they had hit on the same problem that prevailed in 'the North' right into the Twentieth Century - such wealth as there was, was largely based on mineral resources, and as these were worked out, or became uneconomic against easier-won stuff from overseas, that economy died. That has been true at many periods - lead mining in the Pennines and elsewhere - collapse of Western Empire means no market, so why mine? And at several later periods the industry has revived, only to collapse again as market conditions changed.

 

Third point - although we Northerners like to think that those industries, and the infrastructure such as canals and railways that supported them, were 'ours' it actually was rarely true. The Stockton and Darlington was, certainly, funded largely by the Peases, Backhouses and other Northern banking families, but most of the finance for railways, and collieries, ironworks etc, was then as now derived from London-based capital markets - and of course if they got nervous, or crashed, guess who suffered. See for instance the struggles of the Stanhope and Tyne Railway or, a generation later, the devastation caused by the collapse of Overend Gurney (which was one of those 'clearing bank' operations that none of us understand, but which took down a large number of other financial institutions, especially the more local banks in the North that weren't as well capitalised, nearly finished the Consett Iron Company who owed money to one of those local bans, pushed the S&D into merger with the NER [OK, that was a good thing] and so on).

 

There's another thought about capital. 62613 above is of course quite right that profits from slave-powered overseas investments boosted the early phase of the industrial revolution - but by the time of the major investments in railways, say 1830 onwards, that system was thankfully at and end. Meanwhile, it isn't particularly obvious that 'slave money' was reinvested in British Industry -  as with the Nabobs pulling dodgy fortunes out of India, the aim was to achieve social advancement which meant country houses and estates, not the grubby areas of trade and industry. (we can still recognise that - if you got a sudden windfall, would you put that into a better property (the value can only go up, can't it? literally safe as houses) or into a speculative new technology promoted on the one hand by a semi-literate Geordie, or on the other by a dreamer who wants to build ships that are bigger than the Almighty gave Noah, or carriages run by gusts of air, and in any case is suspiciously French!

 

But after about 1875, land (as in agriculture) stopped being a profit centre, mainly because of free trade with the American Prairies, Russia/Ukraine etc. So just at the time when 'first generation, world leading' technology needed to be replaced, UK sources of capital started to dry up - while if you did have some free cash, overseas returns  (sadly, not even in our Empire, where we might have done some good to balance the bad, but in competitors such as the US, Argentine, Germany and, notoriously, Russia) were more attractive.

 

Any of this sound famiiar?

 

My personal problem is that, despite what I have written above, 'free trade' is probably the only political/economic principal I would go to the barricades for. Does that make me a complete cretin? It doesn't, necessarily, make me 'Tory scum' - I'm looking at my great grandfather's daybooks from circa 1900. He is of course a Liberal  because, even though the Lambton pits have now been bought over by Joicey, that is what that part of the coalfield was. (Might be different if you worked for the Londonderry pits, which he did later: skilled staff like engineers seemed to exploit the system rather like modern day footballers, happily transferring to a new 'club' against which they have been competing for years). 

 

Any way, the point is it was the new Independent Socialists who were vehemently against 'tariff reform' which basically meant protectionism, Empire preference and the like, because it would increase the price of food and other imports for the working man. The repeal of the Corn Laws still wasn't a settled matter even 60 years after. Mind you, if any of us or our kids and grandkids had been taught anything about the Corn Laws (which notoriously split the Tory party under that undoubted Northerner, Peel), we might have had a slightly more nuanced debate over Brexit!.

 

[62613]

4 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

 

I lived in Milton Keynes for 12 years or so and there are some troubled areas of Milton Keynes which are very deprived. Similarly having worked in London and Southampton in that time I'm familiar with some of the social issues of those cities. Southampton has a lot of social issues linked to economic hardship. Conversely there's no shortage of affluence and wealth in Northern areas, it's not all a post-industrial wasteland. Which is why these divisions don't really work as they assume we can package the country into a rich half of winners and a poor half of losers when reality is nothing like as simple. I had a higher standard of living in Cumbria than we had down South for the first few years as my salary was basically the same but I had a massively higher mortgage and commuting expenses. 

Yes, in the places you mentioned, there are islands with problems in a sea of relative prosperity. The other side of the line, there are islands of relative prosperity in a sea of problems

 

[rockershovel]

Important point above, about the mobility of professionals like engineers. It's characteristic of such people that their doings are, or can be valuable - but they lack the capital and political influence to benefit directly. 

 

Hence their interests are served by seeking the best remuneration they can get for exercising those skills. 

 

In European countries, most of which have suffered periodic economic and political disaster through recurrent warfare over the "modern era", the value of producing actual wealth is well understood and engineers are valued. 

 

Here, not so. Engineers are the disposable handmaiden of financial manipulation; hence the exodus to Empire and beyond, and the subsequent exodus, full stop. They show no loyalty because they expect none, and are rarely disappointed in their expectations.