The Northern Agenda

Reaction to the Rochdale by-election result | 2080: the year when the life expectancy North-South gap really changes

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Episode notes

This week the focus of Northern politicians is on Leeds, where the Convention of the North will see hundreds of the region's political and business leaders try and work out how to make our region a powerhouse again.

Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove and Labour's Deputy Leader Angela Rayner will be making their pitch about what their parties can do for the North at the two-day Convention of the North conference.

But a report out today from the IPPR North think-tank sets out how far there still is to go and says it will be 2080 - a full five decades away - before the gap in healthy life expectancy between the North and the South East really changes.

The question is, what do we do about it? And this week on the podcast Rob Parsons speaks to Richards Stubbs, CEO of Health Innovation Yorkshire and the Humber, one of the organisations behind a new report that says focusing our attention on creating high-skilled jobs is the best way to get the North off its collective sick bed.

The research prompts the intriguing question, if we want to save the NHS in the North of England do we need better hospitals, or better train links?

But in terms of the national media, the only story in town as far as the North is concerned is the absolute chaos of the Rochdale by-election, where, as you might remember from our episode two weeks ago, what started out as a safe Labour seat has now seen the party without a candidate and voters subjected to one of the most divisive election campaigns in recent years.

Joseph Timan of the Manchester Evening News sends in a dispatch about who won as firebrand former Labour MP George Galloway bids to pull off a shock upset to return him to Parliament.

The Northern Agenda is a Laudable production for Reach. It is presented by Rob Parsons, and produced by Daniel J. McLaughlin.

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