Three years ago, Ipsos asked Britons a simple question: does the government care about places like yours? Eighty per cent said no. Not eighty per cent of the North, or of the poorest areas – eighty per cent of everyone, comfortable and struggling, north and south alike. In a few weeks, Andy Burnham will enter Downing Street with an answer to that number: move power out of Westminster, to regions and towns, and people will feel they count again. He is right that place sits at the heart of Britain’s unhappiness, but the cure he is carrying into No. 10 is a fantasy. 

It is no accident that people in Scotland and Wales remain lukewarm about devolution

It is no accident that people in Scotland and Wales remain lukewarm about devolution

Ask people what they want from the place they live, and they’ll tell you they want more say, more control, more power over their own area. But keep talking to them – as I have for four years while researching a book on this – and they’ll tell you what they actually mean. They want their place to feel looked after. They want it to be somewhere that still works. They want, in short, what that Ipsos question asked about: to feel that somebody cares. 

Start with power. Pushing it out of Whitehall is now something many politicians agree on. The theory is that bringing decisions closer will make people feel heard. Which sounds obvious. It is also wrong.

Scotland and Wales have held real power for more than 25 years but only around a third of people in Wales and fewer than half in Scotland think it has been a good thing. Offered more power, people often decline to use it: turnout for........

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