MIKE HAWKING, POLICY AND PARTNERSHIPS MANAGER (WORK), JRF
It is simply not acceptable that there are parts of the UK that have been locked out of opportunity for so long. The lack of vibrancy in some towns and cities contributed to the vote to leave the EU, with many citizens just wanting to see a change, any change, that might help to improve the prospects in their local area. In the workshops we held with The UK in a Changing Europe—expertly outlined on the previous page—we detected a real sense of frustration from low-income voters with the dominance of London and the surrounding area in our economic and political life. This wasn’t a view expressed just in the north either; voters in Southampton and Hastings identified the same problem.