The North East’s distance from central government in London, and its proximity to the Scottish Borders, is a thread that runs through the governance of the region. The dominant neoliberal emphasis on regional productivity and employment continues to shape a negative image of the North East nationally, and in England, central government exerts a high degree of control over investment and spending (Raikes et al, 2019). Attempts to increase regional autonomy were made in 2004, when the North East was the first English region to have a referendum on an elected regional assembly. Based on a turnout of nearly 50 per cent, the proposal was rejected and, as a consequence, similar referendums that were planned elsewhere were abandoned (Rallings and Thrasher, 2006). Nevertheless, regional structures, including its regional development agency (ONE North East) and GONE, endured until the regional tier was abolished by the Coalition government (2010–15).
While regional devolution failed, various other forms of devolved governance have been introduced that have produced a confusing and fragmented institutional array. There are now four layers of regional devolution, added to disparate catchment areas used by the health, emergency and police services. This creates a disjointed picture of governance, with impacts for public participation and accountability (Shaw and Robinson, 2018), and many of the new bodies ‘fail to offer equity for rural communities and places’ (Davoudi et al, 2017: 20).
Of the four layers of devolution, the first consisted of supra regional growth deals, including the Northern Powerhouse, which unites North East, North West and parts of North Wales. At the subregional level, the first was city-region devolution (‘combined authorities’), introduced through the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009. By April 2018, 12 devolution deals had been announced for England (at the time of writing, 11 remain). Eight of these, including the Tees Valley Combined Authority and the North of Tyne Combined Authority, have elected ‘metro mayors’ (Wilson and Paun, 2019). Of the eight combined authorities with metro mayors, the North of Tyne and Tees Valley have the fewest devolved powers (Wilson and Paun, 2019).
The second layer of devolution (‘city deals’) was brought about through the Localism Act 2011. In December 2011, the first wave of city deals was launched, offering new powers over finance and planning to more than 30 major UK cities to date. Newcastle was in the first wave of the eight largest British cities, while Sunderland and the North East were in the second wave (Ward, 2018). A separate round of local growth deals was launched in 2014, applying to local enterprise partnership areas: the North East, Tees Valley and York, North Yorkshire, and East Riding growth deals were all announced in 2015.
A further trend that may raise concern for regional cohesion and spatial justice is the breaking away of more from less prosperous subregions. Real growth in gross value added (a measure of the worth of goods and services generated) between 2009 and 2017 in (what has become since 2018) the North of Tyne Combined Authority set of local authorities was 13.8 per cent, while growth for the same period in the Tees Valley Combined Authority was only 2.8 per cent (ONS, 2018).
Economic restructuring
The turn of the millennium saw a period of restructuring and improvement of economic performance for the North East. Regional gross value added for the North East grew by almost a third between 1995 and 2002 (Midgley et al, 2005: 4). The declining traditional industries (mining, steel, shipbuilding, chemicals and heavy engineering) gave way to a services economy, entrepreneurship, innovation and new forms of industry, including pharmaceutical, digital and biotech (GONE, 2008; CLES, 2014; Charles and Liddle, 2018). This transformation has been encapsulated in the phrase ‘from coal to call centres, from ships to microchips’.
The strong growth trend, which coincided with a period of high levels of investment from EU structural funds prior to the accession of East European countries to the EU, peaked in 2004 and has never been attained again since (Charles and Liddle, 2018). Besides a reduction in EU funds, the economy was hit by the 2008 financial crisis and subsequent austerity; public sector jobs were particularly hard hit. Summary statistics from March 2008 to June 2017 show a decline in public sector jobs in the North East from 25.7 per cent of all jobs to 20.3 per cent of all jobs – effectively around 60,000 jobs, more than one in five, were lost to the public sector over this period (ONS, 2017). This was a greater proportion than any other English region and only comparable to Wales. This level of loss also generates local multiplier effects within the economy (CLES, 2014). By 2019, the North East had the lowest employment rate (72.2 per cent) of all nine English regions and UK administrations, even lower than that of Northern Ireland (ONS, 2019). Reciprocally, it had the highest unemployment rate nationally (at 5.8 per cent in 2019) (ONS, 2019), a labour market characterised by lower than average wages and high rates of poverty and poor health, demonstrating substantial challenges for social renewal.
Cultural renaissance
The modern cultural image of the region was to a great degree shaped by post-war arts policy. At the end of the Second World War, developments in broadcasting and cultural policy fostered the development of ‘cultural regions’ in the UK. Radio programme makers in the North East gave an outlet for the kinds of pipe music, popular songs, stories and dialect associated with the area – ‘The Blaydon Races’ ballad being the best-known example – which may have supported the consolidation of a regional culture (Vall, 2011: 7). The North East has some well-established world heritage sites, as mentioned earlier, and several established museums of national importance, including the Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle and the Great Museum of the North (formerly The Hancock). Other formal expressions of culture, such as orchestras and art galleries, have historically been sparse in the region, but beginning in the 1980s, the provision of formal arts venues began to improve. Since the late 1980s, culture featured as a pioneering way to spearhead regeneration. The Gateshead Garden Festival in 1989 was one of the foundational initiatives in the region, using a cultural event as a way of attracting investment for regeneration, and attracted both national and international attention. Following on from its success, Northern Arts published a document entitled ‘The case for capital’ in 1995, which helped to bring in funding for culture-led regeneration, including the creation of what have since become iconic buildings and heritage attractions, and the improvement of existing features. Outstanding examples include the National Glass Centre in Sunderland and the Sage (international music centre) and Baltic (centre for contemporary art) in the Quayside area of Newcastle and Gateshead, with more projects, such as the Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA), following after the millennium. A recent addition is the Auckland Project, a museums complex in the Durham market town of Bishop Auckland that includes a restoration of the historic castle, a new Faith Museum, a viewing tower and a Mining Art Gallery. The original flagship regeneration projects, often with an arts focus, not only made the region a beacon for the economic benefits of a public and private sector
