Moving forward, together

Hello everyone. This week, I’d like to tell you about a couple of things that Bury is playing an important in at the Greater Manchester level, alongside the other councils and the Mayor Andy Burnham.

Firstly, I’m delighted to have been re-appointed as the GM lead for technical education and skills, continuing to lead on one of the biggest parts of the new devolution trailblazer deal agreed with the Government. The specific focus on technical education is deliberate too.

For too long, technical education has been treated as the poor relation of academic learning. Yes, A-levels and university is the way to go for some young people, and everyone who can benefit from this path should be free to travel down it.

But what about the two-thirds of young people in this part of the country who do not take the academic route? They need alternative choices which are every bit as valuable, and valued.

I will be doing everything I can to help bring this about, because everyone can benefit from this aspiration to create two equal pathways for learning. It’s good for young people, it’s good for employers, and it will benefit our economy and our communities.

Bury will also benefit from another GM-wide initiative we’re pressing ahead with – the next step to bring buses under local control.

Again, everyone’s a winner if we can encourage more use of public transport, which the current cap on bus fares appears to be doing. It means cleaner air for us all to breathe, and less congestion on the roads - which in turn will help the buses to run on time, encouraging more people to use it. A virtuous circle indeed!

Greater Manchester is the only place outside London to be doing this. But the Government needs to ensure that the funding is there to make it happen. We don’t want to inherit a bus network that is in decline or financially unable to operate. London had more than £1 billion spent on supporting its transport system recover from Covid; our system currently requires a fraction of this but will suffer without it nonetheless. To make bus franchising a success, we need the Government to act like a long-term partner and not walk away when they are needed most.

Both transport and skilled education requires us to work closely across the city region, and I’m very proud that Bury is playing a central role in this.