Dealing with Boris Johnson's Government over the last three years has been "like shouting into the abyss", Andy Burnham told the M.E.N.
as he called on the next Tory Prime Minister to "empower the North". Reflecting on Johnson's time in office, the Greater Manchester Mayor said that all too often there had been a gap between rhetoric and delivery. "It's the Johnson gap", he said. "All of his political career it's been there and it's played out in a colossal way in the North of England, where the promises were biggest to us and the lack of delivery or the gap between those promises and what we got was greater than anywhere else." READ MORE: Public asked where smoking should be banned in Greater Manchester The comments come a day after the House of Commons levelling up committee concluded that the flagship Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill "lacked the clarity and funding commitments needed to transform local communities." Asked to characterise his dealings with Number 10 and the wider Government machine since 2019, Mr Burnham said: "It's felt like you're just shouting into the abyss really, not being heard at all." He added: "I'm not going to put it all at the door of the outgoing Prime Minister or his his outgoing Cabinet, I think it's still a sort of a wider Whitehall thing.
They don't like other parts of the country answering back. "And what they've experienced for the first time, over the last few years, is parts of the country answering back.
I think it's been a shock to the Westminster system but I'm afraid it's here to stay, there's just no way we're going back to life before." The former Labour MP, speaking to the Northern Agenda podcast this week, said he would like to see Johnson's successor hand more power to
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