Mayors enjoy their moment in top billing at Labour Party Conference

The city region Metro Mayors were everywhere this week and arguably had the best time of any cohort at the party conference as they rose to seize devolution’s elevated status under Labour.

“Mayors have provided the energy at conference,” Prof Charlie Jeffery, chair of the N8 Research group of top Northern universities, wasn’t wrong when he addressed a Northern Powerhouse Partnership fringe gathering.

Oliver Coppard, South Yorkshire Metro Mayor, told guests at the same meeting: “The reality is that we now have a partner in South Yorkshire in government who wants to work with us to solve…problems and wants to grab the opportunities that the future presents.”

Jim McMahon, the former leader of Oldham Council and now devolution minister, said “Mayors are our powerhouse”.

Judging by the attendees following mayors and combined authorities around the speaking circuit everyone wants devolution if they haven’t got it already.

And if they already have a devo deal they want an upgrade – a bit like the latest iPhone – as they seek more flexibility and funding – each new devolution deal being different from the last as the movement has evolved.

The team on the stand promoting Liverpool City Region Combined Authority said people from other areas had approached them for advice on setting one up.

At the ‘in conversation with’ fringe session between GM Metro Mayor Andy Burnham and Andrew Carter, chief executive of Centre for Cities, guests from Wales and London asked about lessons learned in the original devolved city region. Standing at the side of the room watching Burnham with interest was Nik Johnson, Metro Mayor of Cambridge and Peterborough, one of 10 Labour Metro Mayors now, with more to come.

So what did they hear from Burnham? Labour is on the same page as the regional cities. Local control is a must. Over housing, education, transport. Public interest has been sidelined in recent years, even as the Conservatives expanded the devolution deals. Single financial settlements, as opposed to constrained department funding pots, are essential to enable local decisions that could have more value for public money.

Elsewhere, Northern activists at the Chartered Institute for Housing were breathing sighs of relief that they now had a government that agreed on the fundamentals, they “couldn’t even get a conversation going under the Conservatives”.

The policy roadmap Chancellor Rachel Reeves drew in her speech on Monday talked of the “end of trickle-down, trickle-out economics.”

Kicking off conference on Sunday, Angela Rayner said the devolution roll-out needed to be finished once and for all.

After the Cabinet headliners, mayors were the support act at the busiest conference Labour has ever held.

The last government showed that simply talking about levelling up and writing devolution deals was not enough to see serious change outside London.

Burnham said he wanted to see a network of mayors across the British Isles enabling better collaboration and policy implementation. Starmer has promised to implement the Council of Nations and Regions floated by previous governments but not enacted.

Grassroots, ground-up economics with delegated powerholders around the regions need proper funding to be worth anything and close the North-South divide.

The past few days have clearly been fun for the Metro Mayors touring their upbeat routines around the Liverpool waterfront with an added skip in their step. The next performance awaits.