When I was doing my growing up in suburban west London, Manchester neighbourhoods like Whalley Range and Rusholme – eulogised by Morrissey of the Smiths – sounded exotic. Yet Manchester was a city in decline, sparring with its north-west neighbour Liverpool as proud former industrial city of glory most ravaged by Thatcherism.
I later went to live in the city and taught at University of Manchester for six years, during which I was a Labour list candidate in the European elections in 2004. It was good then to be back on my old stomping ground at the weekend, for a wedding as it happens.
The hot Manchester topic du jour of conversation this time round was the proposed congestion charge. Being a Londoner hearing such arguments, I am convinced that congestion charging be introduced to Manchester – unpopular though it may sound at first mention.
For a start, the detail of the Manchester proposals are very different to what we ended up with in London. If you separate fact from scaremongering, it emerges that relatively few journeys will be charged given where the boundaries of the two zones lie, and because it will only operate at peak commuter times (unlike the London version). See this report from the BBC.
So driving in from Eccles to the west (technically Salford) and Levenshulme in South Manchester, as I’ve done in the last couple of days, will not cost a bean. The charging will be quite modest – £1 for the inner ring and £2 for outer ring.
The resultant expansion of the Metrolink (tram) to facilitate park-and-ride would hugely benefit the city. Current, unnecessary carbon-creating stop-start journeys of 10 miles an hour in rush-hour traffic will be reduced.
In short, the government needs to be confident of the case it’s putting to Manchester on this one rather than being browbeaten by naysayers. For every condemnation, such as that from the increasingly embittered ex-minister Graham Stringer, there is evidence to the contrary. See, for example, the findings that traffic is a ‘growing drain’ on Greater Manchester’s quality of life and that congestion charging will mean quicker journey times and better health outlined by a leading academic from University of Manchester in this report.
Sorting out difficult challenges (domestic terrorism, foot and mouth, flooding) used to be Brown’s forte not so long ago. He needs to regain that advantage. Whilst on paper no one likes paying for anything there are huge benefits to be reaped from this measure. Labour needs to confidently convince the public of the case for change on this matter, as it does more widely regarding its programme for the nation. Or we could be in for some nasty consequences ahead.
Rupa Huq