Levelling up has ‘stalled’ under Sunak, says think tank

The levelling up agenda has stalled under Rishi Sunak’s leadership, a think tank has said. The Institute for Government accused the prime minister of lacking the “sustained leadership” required to “ruthlessly prioritise” the agenda. “Central government is not set up to deliver this government’s promise – or Labour’s plans – to reduce regional inequality,” it said in its Levelling Up from the Centre report. It added: “Although the Levelling Up White Paper recognised many of these challenges and took some welcome steps, like announcing 12 missions, the agenda has stalled because Rishi Sunak is failing its first test of needing to ruthlessly prioritise levelling up and demonstrate sustained leadership.” The report said progress on levelling up had been “undermined by the reduced momentum and political drive from the centre since July 2022”, when Boris Johnson stepped down as prime minister. The report said the cabinet committee chaired by levelling up secretary Michael Gove had been “downgraded”, while his department had struggled to co-ordinate the agenda, which had “not been a priority for other departments” since Sunak entered Downing Street. The IfG report also said that new shadow levelling up secretary Angela Rayner needed to do more to define Labour’s “opportunity for all” vision. Without detail, that ran the risk of becoming an “empty slogan”, which is how Labour has dismissed the government’s levelling up plan. It said a Labour government must develop a set of cross-government structures to reduce regional inequalities. To send feedback, e-mail piers.wehner@eg.co.uk or tweet @PiersWehner or @EGPropertyNews