PM gambles on new 'levelling up' funding to tackle rise of Reform

Deprived areas to get tens of millions of pounds to fix broken communities

- Kiran Stacey

Deprived areas of the UK will be given tens of millions of pounds each from a fund Keir Starmer hopes will help Labour tackle the Reform UK threat.

The prime minister will launch the regeneration initiative today, gambling that an updated version of the Tory “levelling up” strategy will address anger about Britain's broken communities.

He will say the money will help “get rid of the boarded-up shops, shuttered youth clubs and crumbling parks that have become symbols of a system that stopped listening”.

More than 300 areas across the country will each be given the cash to patch up derelict shops, pubs and libraries, as well as new powers to decide which businesses can set up on their high streets. The new fund forms a central plank of Labour's policy response to the rise of Reform, which the prime minister believes is thriving in part because of voters' discontent at the poor state of their local communities.

It also forms part of Starmer's own fightback against his internal and external critics - including the Manchester mayor, Andy Burnham - who accuse him of failing to do enough to stop Nigel Farage's party establishing a 10-point lead in the polls.

The prime minister said: “As a nation we have so much that unites us, but we are also a country of a thousand neighbourhoods, where our sense of pride depends on what we can see from our doorstep.

“I know people are proud of their area, which is why they are so desperate to look after what they love, and to get rid of the boarded-up shops, shuttered youth clubs and crumbling parks that have become symbols of a system that stopped listening.