Manchesterism - themes from three conversations

I’ve now finished our three-part #RadicalReformers exploration of #Manchesterism with Eve Holt, Thomas Johnson and Warren Heppolette.

Plenty of people have been giving their view on Manchesterism and what they think it means for the future of public service and governance reform. I started exploring this back in July – mostly focusing on how the centre of government interacts with local areas and how “Manchesterism” might affect that. See here - Manchesterism: collaboration, devolution and the limits of Whitehall.

Now the series is complete, I wanted to briefly reflect on the themes I think come across throughout. These are hopefully reassuring consistent with a lot of us have been saying.

What we need to do it becoming very clear. See what you think…

Incidentally, responding to some teasing, I’ve always written using dashes. Some people don’t like it - but it’s not an AI tell in this instance!

Place before organisation

This is probably the most fundamental theme.

Warren articulates it most explicitly - public services should be organised from the perspective of “the population served and the place that you are trying to make more successful”, rather than around the organisational boundaries of councils, NHS bodies or government departments.

The Manchester Independent Economic Review was pivotal for Warren. Its argument was that Greater Manchester could not realise its economic potential unless it simultaneously addressed the health and wellbeing of its population. That creates a very different conception of economic development which must include health, housing, skills, transport, employment and public services become parts of one place-based system rather than separate policy domains.

Warren describes health devolution as a mechanism for connecting services around the realities of people's lives rather than preserving the separation between sectors.

Thomas comes at it from public service reform angle - the state and its systems of support should be designed around “the reality of people's lives and the reality of places.”

His idea of “pluralism” is grounded in the fact that a place inevitably contains multiple institutions, professions and communities so the task is to make those different elements operate well together and are greater than the sum of their parts.

Greater Manchester had a compelling answer to the question “What do you want devolution for?” It wasn't simply seeking more powers or money. There was an underlying proposition about making a place, its economy and its population more successful. That gives individual devolution deals a coherence that a shopping list of powers would not have.

Collaboration as an operating system, not a partnership initiative

This is probably the strongest thread running through all three conversations.

Eve describes collaboration as Greater Manchester's “secret sauce”. The GMCA isn't an organisation sitting above ten councils. Constitutionally, it is the ten councils plus the mayor. Decisions are made collectively and largely through consensus. The habit is therefore to find common ground across political, geographical and organisational differences.

I dare you to find a place anywhere that doesn’t talk about collaboration – but how do you make it real and not just niceties around the Boardroom table.

Thomas makes a very useful distinction between partnership and collaboration. Collaboration means working together “whatever the weather” not just when institutional interests happen to align.

This doesn’t mean suppressing disagreement. Eve describes healthy conflict and a willingness to confront differences behind closed doors and then get on with the job.

Warren adds that successful collaboration requires organisations to come to the table asking “What can I bring?” rather than “What can I get?”. The behaviours and culture matter at least as much as formal governance structures.

This is quite a profound difference from conventional devolution negotiations, where each institution can be tempted to protect its sovereignty or maximise its individual share of resources. OI am sure many of you have seen this in action and it is quite depressing.

Big ambition combined with patient, enduring delivery

This is the aspect I think could easily be missed if Manchesterism is reduced to just being about Andy Burnham, the GMCA or a particular devolution deal.

The Greater Manchester story predates all of those things.

Thomas has spent around twenty years in the weeds of the Greater Manchester system and the collaboration between the ten councils goes way back. The Independent Economic Review dates from 2008/09 and the Combined Authority only emerged subsequently with Andy Burnham as Mayor coming later still.  

Eve talks about Greater Manchester being several devolution deals into the journey, with powers progressively “snowballing” over time rather than arriving in one constitutional big bang.

Thomas captures the mindset particularly well. Greater Manchester combines seemingly unreasonable ambition (if told you cannot “boil the ocean”, someone will “turn the gas up”) with a highly pragmatic focus on what can be done immediately.

He also highlighted that most of the people operating in and around the GMCA have been doing this for decades! This is a long-term commitment.

It also explains why Manchesterism cannot simply be copied by creating a mayor and combined authority elsewhere. Much of the capability consists of accumulated relationships, institutional memory, habits of collaboration and people who have spent years learning how to work together through thick and thin.

Power should continue to flow downwards – not be horded by the MSA

An important part of Manchesterism is that power should continue to flow downwards.

Eve is explicit that communities, voluntary organisations and civil society are not adjuncts to the public sector. They are part of the “scaffolding” and a “springboard” through which a different model of public services can be created.

Warren's description of the emerging preventative model makes the same point. Integrated support rooted at neighbourhood level, involving community organisations and local social businesses, with success potentially defined more by conditions and behaviours than tightly prescribed interventions.

Devolution isn't really complete if power stops at the combined authority.

What is Manchesterism anyway?

The main themes from these conversations are (in my opinion):

1. Place before institution 

2. Collaborate whatever the weather 

3. Big ambition - but pragmatic, patient delivery 

4. Continue to push power downwards

   
   

As a final bit of fun, I asked Chat GPT to read this and suggest a short paragraph to describe Manchesterism….

“Manchesterism is a way of leading a place that puts people and place before institutional boundaries, and treats collaboration as an everyday operating principle rather than a partnership exercise. It combines big ambition with patient, pragmatic delivery, built on relationships and trust developed over many years. And crucially, it sees devolution not as power stopping at the regional level, but as a means of continuing to push power downwards to councils, neighbourhoods and communities”.

What do you think?

Andrew Laird

Chief Executive, Mutual Ventures

If you would like to discuss any of this further, please drop Andrew a message at andrew@mutualventures.co.uk.