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Andy Burnham's first Labour conference speech as Prime Minister was significant. Among other things, for those of us who have spent years banging on about devolution, there was further confirmation that the current Government is the most determined to decentralise the country in recent years – perhaps ever.Burnham promised ‘more power in the hands of people and places to set their own ambitions' and ended with a commitment to drive power ‘out of Whitehall and into every postcode'.This is increasingly backed by something more substantial than rhetoric. With a plan for fiscal devolution on the way, and No10 North pulling together an ambitious new devolution White Paper – one whose contents, I am told, will cut across every Whitehall department – the rollercoaster of recent devolution policy has accelerated.There is, though, an interesting tension buried in Burnham's prospectus.Having said that places should decide their own destiny, he also told conference that he intends to take what he had done in Manchester – its model for good growth – and ‘drive it from the very centre of Government into every postcode in Britain'.Therein lies a risk for ‘Manchesterism', the oft-mentioned organising philosophy of the Burnham administration.One-size-fits-all policies emanating from even a region-friendly central government means that the wait for radical devolution continues.Greater Manchester is interesting precisely because it has spent years assembling institutions, relationships and policies around the specific circumstances of Greater Manchester. The lesson from that cannot simply be that we have finally discovered the correct model and should now reproduce it everywhere else.Scope for real differentiation should be one of the principal tests of this agenda.One-size-fits-all policies emanating from even a region-friendly central government means that the wait for radical devolution continues.Take buses. Burnham's government has announced a £2 national cap on participating single fares outside London. It will be popular – and with good reason – cheaper buses can make a tangible difference to household budgets.But if transport is increasingly a responsibility of empowered local leaders, why is the appropriate price of a bus journey being decided in Whitehall?As public transport in English cities increasingly comes into the control of strategic authorities, one mayor might conclude that £2 is exactly right. Another might prefer to put more money into frequency, rural routes or orbital services. Another might prioritise free travel for young people, or cheaper fares for people moving into work.There is a perfectly coherent alternative argument – that affordable public transport should become something closer to a national social entitlement, with nationally determined prices or perhaps, eventually, something approaching provision free at the point of use. That would be a major policy choice. It would also be a different organising principle from devolution.England has repeatedly confused devolution with decentralised delivery. Whitehall decides the policy, establishes the programme, specifies the outcomes and often designs the funding rules. Local institutions are then given some discretion over implementation. Devolution worthy of the name should go further.Employment support provides a good example. Recently, Re:State published No Job for the Centre, arguing that Jobcentre Plus should be abolished and its employment support role fundamentally reorganised.The Government's existing reforms are already attempting to make the system more locally responsive, including aligning Jobcentre Plus geographies more closely with mayoral areas and creating a new national Jobs and Careers Service.Our proposal takes the logic further. Responsibility and budgets for more intensive face-to-face employment support should move to mayoral strategic authorities. Whitehall would concentrate on standards, evidence and transparency. The point is not simply to relocate Jobcentre Plus.An area with high rates of long-term sickness will face a different problem from one dominated by young people moving between insecure jobs.One area could integrate employment support with health and neighbourhood infrastructure while another might organise provision around colleges, major employers or particular industrial clusters.And, if different approaches succeed, other places can copy them. That is how a decentralised system experiments, learns, and iterates.Burnham is right that Britain needs to rewire the state. The next stage is perhaps the hardest for any national government: accepting that distributing power also means surrendering the ability to determine every answer.Simon Kaye is director of policy and research at Re:State

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DEVOLUTION

The devo difference

By Simon Kaye | 06 October 2026

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