Most Greater Manchester people want mayor to get more powers, poll shows

The vast majority of people living in Greater Manchester want to see more powers given to the mayor, according to a new poll.

A survey commissioned by Centre for Cities ahead of May’s local elections found that 85 per cent of adults supported greater devolution to the region.

More than half want the mayor to take on more direct responsibility for providing affordable homes, while 47 per cent said the office should do more to support businesses.

Four in ten people say the office should have a greater control over tax and spending as well as Greater Manchester’s bus network, which is coming back under public control.

The polling was carried out by Savanta ComRes to understand the impact of devolution and the role of Greater Manchester mayor since the first elections in 2017.

It also analysed how people felt about the handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, with 57 per cent approving of Greater Manchester mayor’s approach compared to 48 per cent approval for the government and 44 per cent for their local council.

The Greater Manchester mayor’s approval levels for handling of the Covid-19 pandemic are higher than other metro mayors across the UK including London, Liverpool and the West Midlands.

Almost nine in ten people knew there was a regional mayor, with just under two thirds correctly identifying Andy Burnham as the incumbent mayor.

Mr Burnham is running for re-election as the Labour candidate, while the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats are fielding Laura Evans and Simon Lepori respectively. 

Melanie Horrocks is standing for the Green Party, Nick Buckley for Reform UK, Stephen Morris for the English Democrats and Michael Elston as an independent candidate.

The full and final list of candidates is expected to be published later today (Friday April 9).

Whoever is elected, the poll says 55 per cent of people want the mayor to focus on health care provision in their term of office, with two thirds wanting more to be done to help schools and build more houses.

Polling indicates that public priorities have shifted significantly during the Covid-19 pandemic compared to a separate poll conducted, with people placing greater importance on business support, schools and adult education.

However the importance of public transport has waned amongst the electorate, with Centre for Cities linking this to a drop in usage during lockdown.

The think tank’s chief executive Andrew Carter said: “People in Greater Manchester overwhelmingly support shifting power out of Whitehall and down to the city-region. 

“Devolving more responsibility for providing affordable housing, supporting businesses and running adult education schemes are all popular with the public in Greater Manchester.

“At the 2019 election, the government backed the principle of more devolution in England yet, more than a year later, we are still waiting to see what its plans are.

“As Greater Manchester looks to recover from the pandemic, it is vital that the government listens to demands for more devolution and gives the next mayor the powers and resources to build back better. 

“People want Whitehall to do less, it’s time for it to listen.”

Savanta ComRes interviewed 565 residents of Greater Manchester aged 18+ online between February 26 and March 16, 2021.

Data was weighted to be demographically representative of the region by age, gender, borough and social grade. 

The previous wave of this research was conducted among 501 Manchester residents between January 27 and February 14, 2020.