Plymouth is ranked as UK's top-performing city in index

WORK-LIFE BALANCE AND JOBS AMONG HIGH SCORES

- ALISTAIR HOUGHTON

PLYMOUTH has been ranked as Britain's top-performing city in an influential index based on a number of measures, from life expectancy to new business start-up rates.

The annual Demos-PwC Good Growth for Cities Index aims to rank the UK's 51 largest cities, plus the London boroughs.

Plymouth rose from sixth to first in the table thanks to high scores on work-life balance, income distribution and jobs.

The index's 11 measures also include house prices to earnings, commuting times and store open and closures rates.

Bristol - which rose two places to second on the Index - performs well on jobs and work-life balance, as well as skills. Swindon was fourth in the table, while Exeter was sixth, with South West locations consistently scoring above the UK average for health and safety and skills.

The region's towns and cities scored less well on new businesses and house price-to-earnings ratios relative to the rest of the UK.