Tories break levelling up manifesto promise, costing English regions over £1bn

The Conservatives have broken a totemic pledge on levelling up which will leave communities in England over £1 billion worse off by 2025.  

New analysis by Labour has found that the North, West Midlands and South West of England will lose the most from the Tories’ broken manifesto pledge to at least match previous development funding targeted at regions most in need.  

The South East and East of England will suffer the smallest cuts.  

Staffordshire, where the Conservatives are hosting their Cabinet away day on Thursday, will face a cut of £35m.  

The Tories promised in their 2019 manifesto to 'at a minimum match the size' of EU Structural Funds, which were strongly skewed towards the most deprived areas, with their replacement scheme, the Shared Prosperity Fund, which was announced in April 2022.  

However, adjusting for inflation and the different spending cycles of the two schemes, the Shared Prosperity Fund delivers £371m a year less on average for English regions, breaking that central manifesto pledge.  

The North West is the hardest hit, losing £206m, while the South West loses £164m. The West Midlands loses £158m, Yorkshire & The Humber £156m, and the North East £136m.  

By contrast, the South East loses just £52m and the East of England £53m.  

The only two regions to receive more funding in real terms are in the South East: Solent and Buckinghamshire.  

Lisa Nandy MP, Labour's Shadow Levelling Up Secretary, said:  

“Our communities don’t need symbolic gestures like Cabinet away days. They need investment, support with the cost of living crisis, and a government that keeps its promises.  

“The Tories have broken their promise to level up. Not only is England losing over £1 billion of much-needed investment, but the biggest cuts will fall on the parts of the country that can least afford it.  

“People urgently need money back in their pockets, and our communities need investment to bring back good jobs that have been lost over decades.”  

Ends

Notes to editors:

• Between 2014 and 2020 English regions received £6.4bn in EU Structural Funds, with money strongly skewed towards the most deprived areas. Figures have been adjusted to 2024/25 prices to reflect the final year of the Shared Prosperity Fund allocation and allow for a direct comparison.  
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• The Conservatives promised in their 2019 manifesto to 'at a minimum match the size of those funds in each nation' with their replacement scheme, the Shared Prosperity Fund.
  See page 44: https://www.conservatives.com/our-plan/conservative-party-manifesto-2019  

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• However, the Shared Prosperity Fund runs for just three years and amounts to an average of £540m a year for English regions. The Government claims communities won’t lose out as the SPF supposedly ramps up while EU funding tails off, but this analysis proves there will be a shortfall.  

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• That means the Shared Prosperity Fund, in addition to hindering long-term investment by running for just three-year cycles, delivers £1.1bn less in funding than the scheme it was designed to replace, and which the Conservatives promised to match.