Burnley: Aiming for the next level

Basking in his general election glory, Boris Johnson pledged to breathe new life into the economies of communities in the North that had delivered him victory. “Levelling-up” became his mantra.

Burnley, no longer that solid brick in Labour’s red wall, is now waiting to see if and how the PM’s phrase will translate into cold, hard cash.

The council, controlled by a Labour and Lib Dem coalition, and Antony Higginbotham, the town’s first Tory MP in more than a century, are jointly submitting a “significant bid” to the government’s new Levelling-Up Fund.

In total the bid amounts to an investment of £26.26m, with a fund ask of £20m. If successful, the cash will be used on key projects linked to Burnley’s town centre and Canalside masterplan.