Think of “the north” and images that come to mind include Antony Gormley’s Angel of the North, the sculpture of Henry Moore and Manchester’s music scene.
But now a rare show of cross-party unity has called for all of the cultural icons of northern England to be a catalyst to rebuild the region and rebalance it with the rest of the UK.
Ministers will join Labour council leaders and mayors to launch the first report of its kind on Wednesday, which sets out in detail how culture could and should be a central part of the region’s post-pandemic recovery.
Recommendations in a ten-point action plan include devolving funding decisions to a regional level from London; encouraging more strategic partnerships and less competition between different areas; and greater investment in next-generation creative talents.
It calls for culture to be “embedded” in the government’s levelling-up white paper, expected in the next week.
Prof Katy Shaw, lead writer of the Case for Culture report, said she thought many people were fed up with “hearing about the value of the north only in terms…
