City-region debate is mired in history

Sir Peter Hall, Regeneration & Renewal, 23 June 2006

The answer comes in two geographical halves. In the North, there's enthusiasm for city-regions - probably with a mayoral system similar to London's, leaving existing city boundaries as they are. To be politically viable, such regions would need to span a number of second-tier authorities: 33 in the existing London model, a lot fewer up North.

Whether the residents of each city-region would have any sense of belonging to a cohesive unit, as Londoners do with London, is another matter. What has Wigan to do with Manchester, or Wakefield with Leeds? The answer, in recent research from academics in Manchester-Salford, is: it depends on who you are and what you do. Highly-paid Wakefieldians are more likely to commute to Leeds than lowly-paid ones; Leeds' West Yorkshire Playhouse attracts patrons from far beyond West Riding. Having a 'Y' on your car licence plate won't help: Sheffield, Hull and York are regarded as separate fiefdoms.

Such places approximate to Yorkshire's ancient East and North Ridings and the fictional South Riding. Likewise, Central Lancashire equals the urban bits of familiar Lancashire. In such areas, the ancient counties still form useful working definitions of city-regions. The trouble is, the Government has stripped them of powers such as planning. And in the Central Lancashire case, you have four places with little in common. That might matter less if such units served the needs of regeneration or gave places such as Central Lancashire greater clout against a city-region such as Greater Manchester. Otherwise, there is a risk that the core cities might simply extend their bailiwicks over larger territories, at the expense of their smaller, more isolated neighbours.

Down South these problems multiply. A Reading city-region might look uncannily like the Royal County of Berkshire, abolished by John Gummer a decade ago. But would it include nearby Basingstoke in Hampshire, which might object? Are Southampton and Portsmouth one city-region, or two?

Nearly 40 years ago, a Royal Commission facing these problems produced a robust solution: 60 city-regions, with two-tier local governance in the largest conurbations. It got scotched by an incoming Tory government. Will history repeat itself?

Sir Peter Hall (Bartlett) Professor of Planning and Regeneration, University College London. Email: sir.peter.hall@haynet.com