No 10 North is offering relocation packages to Whitehall staff willing to move to Manchester, as the new branch begins taking shape.
No 10 North is already operating in Manchester, and Whitehall officials in central London who are willing to move north are being offered relocation packages, according to the BBC’s understanding. The new branch of Downing Street is part of the push around Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s early plans.
The first base for No 10 North will be Heron House in central Manchester, the same building that also contains offices for the intelligence agency GCHQ. Specialist police officers have been seen outside the site. A longer-term home is expected to be the government’s new Digital Campus in Ancoats, but that project is not due to be finished until 2032.
Very few official details have been confirmed so far. Still, a new report released on Tuesday offers the clearest picture yet of how the No 10 North project could work. The blueprint was written by the Re:State think tank, which Burnham had been involved with before stepping down as mayor of Greater Manchester.
The report sketches out a hiring plan that would bring in staff from across Greater Manchester and the wider North of England. It says about 300 people should be employed within 18 months. It also proposes moving teams from Whitehall departments including the Treasury, the Cabinet Office, and the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, all now led by secretaries of state from the North of England.
The BBC has also been told that at least three senior figures from Burnham’s former mayoral team at the Greater Manchester Combined Authority are understood to have agreed to work at No 10 North. Some GMCA staff were said to be surprised to learn their colleagues were moving only after seeing them on television greeting the new prime minister in Downing Street. The Re:State plan also says the new operation should have a secretary of state in charge, with a junior minister based there too, though Burnham has not announced anything of that kind yet. More formal details are expected later in the House of Lords as appointments continue. The takeaway is simple: Burnham’s Manchester push is moving from idea to machinery, and Whitehall is already being asked to follow.
