Northern campaigners have slammed the Tory leadership hopefuls for failing to back the party’s “levelling-up” agenda.
No10 candidates Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss travel to the heart of the “Red Wall” for tomorrow night’s hustings in Darlington, Co Durham.
But the Northern Powerhouse Partnership think-tank accuses the pair of betraying voters who placed their faith in the Conservatives in the 2019 election.
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It unearthed figures showing how the North East - where tomorrow's debate takes place - had the lowest average earnings across the UK last year at just £27,646, compared with £37,500 in London.
Across the wider Northern Powerhouse region, the average full-time salary was £29,096 - £8,404 less than in the capital.
Think-tank boss Henri Murison said it would take decades to close the gulf between the cash-soaked South East and the North.
He pointed out it was more than eight years since former Chancellor George Osborne, who chairs the NPP and first coined the phrase “Northern Powerhouse” in June 2014, pledged to address the wage divide.
Mr Murison said: “It will take decades of consistent effort following the initial commitments of George Osborne to close the huge earnings gap between Northerners and those in London.
“What is becoming clear is that only (Shadow Chancellor) Rachel Reeves and the Shadow Treasury team are, at the moment, prepared to be serious about this agenda - and that could cost the current Government when those in the so-called Red Wall compare and contrast where the parties stand on the North.”
Mr Sunak triggered uproar last week when a video emerged of him boasting of stripping cash from "deprived urban areas" and pumping funds into leafy, wealthy areas.
The former Chancellor was caught on film in Tunbridge Wells bragging about rewriting Treasury formulas in guidelines known as the “Green Book” so he could inject taxpayers’ money into more affluent towns.
His rival for No10 Liz Truss also sparked fury when she unveiled plans to pay dedicated public sector workers less if they lived in poorer areas.
She quickly U-turned on the wage bombshell.
Mr Murison said: “This leadership election is turning levelling-up from too much rhetoric and not enough delivery to being without any meaning at all - one candidate who keeps claiming she didn’t want to pay Northerners less even though she plainly did, the other who has now claimed a Green Book reform package to level the playing field between the North with London and the South East was about taking money from deprived inner cities in places like Liverpool or Leeds.”
Darlington is the fifth of 12 locations for official Conservative Party hustings between the candidates.
The Tories won the constituency in the December 2019 election, seizing it from Labour which held the seat for 32 years.
Shadow Levelling-Up Secretary Lisa Nandy visited the town last month to deliver a speech on how to reduce regional inequalities.
She said tonight: “The Tory promise to level-up has been exposed as an outright lie.
“Britain faces an appalling choice between a candidate who thinks nurses and teachers are worth less in the North than the South and another who brags about taking money from deprived northern areas and giving it to leafy Tory shires.
“But levelling up isn’t dead – not for people in Darlington and across the country who voted for change and who need and deserve to see it delivered.
“That’s why Labour has a plan to invest to bring good, secure, well-paid jobs back to towns that have lost them, to get money into people’s pockets, and to back our communities to succeed.”
A Department for Levelling-Up, Housing and Communities spokeswoman said: “We are pressing full steam ahead with levelling-up in the North by spending billions through our Levelling-Up Fund.
“We’re improving connectivity by investing in our railways and freeports have created thousands of highly-skilled jobs in the region.
“Leaders in the North are best placed to make decisions about their local areas, which is why already over 67% of the North is represented by a Metro Mayor and just last week, we announced a historic devolution deal putting greater power into the hands of local communities in North Yorkshire.”
