Greater Manchester is Britain in miniature. It has pockets of great prosperity and areas of serious deprivation. It has world-class companies but not enough of them. It has too many poorly skilled people in low-productivity jobs. And it has, as Andy Burnham, frankly admits, its own north-south divide.
The mayor of Greater Manchester says there was once an industrial arc running from Wigan in the west to Rochdale in the north and Oldham and Tameside in the east. When coal and cotton went into decline, these towns did too, and they have never really recovered. But Burnham says he has a plan – called Atom Valley – that can help.
