Yesterday, the Policy Exchange published a report which suggested that the government should stop trying to revive the north, and instead build lots of new houses around London, Oxford and Cambridge and encourage ambitious northerners to move down here. Despite the Policy Exchange's close links with the present Tory leadership, Cameron has dismissed the report, while the Guardian had a substantial G2 feature on the virtues of the north (lovely people, great scenery, and hey, it's a great place for the arts as well). David Cameron called it barmy, and stated that "Conservative policy is focused on the good work of continuing the resurgence of cities across the north of England", and also towards keeping regional development agencies where they are working.
As a southerner myself, I have my own concern about the suggestion about people clearing off down south in large numbers, which is that the cost of living in London is difficult enough as it is; has anybody seen the cost of buying or renting a property? Even if they build a whole load of new boxes in the Thames Valley or around Oxford and Cambridge, these will not be good enough for ambitious incomers, from the north or anywhere else, who will want either proper houses, or nice new flats or studios, in the cities or in desirable suburbs, not in some new estate orphaned on the Thames estuary. These places will become ghettoes.
The Policy Exchange mob have their own agenda, and their own prejudices. One suspects that state-sponsored regeneration is anathema to them anyway, but no doubt they just want to get "their people" out of the "God-forsaken" north with all its small towns divided into "white trash" and Asian ghettoes. Besides their total ignorance of the north itself, which has thriving and well-regarded universities, they seem to think that Oxford and Cambridge are the only places besides London where a self-respecting person might settle, when in fact they are hardly the most industrialised places in the south. Cameron noted that the report's main author was soon off to Australia; one wonders what country he was living in when he wrote this nonsense.
Sallams.
Bradford was mentioned as well. One of the authors actually admitted to the Bradford T&A newspaper that he hadn't even visited Bradford recently!
Pathetic.
Reading official literature on UK demographics, I got the impression that everyone was clearing out of the cities and moving to the countryside.
From Hull and Halifax and Hell,
Good lord deliver me.
Isn't the South East congested enough as it is?
Yes, and I intended to make the point although I got lost in discussion of house prices and potential ghettoes. But yes, the south-east cannot really cope with yet another influx, whether of northerners or anyone else.