UNDERSTANDING BREXIT IMPACTS at a LOCAL LEVEL Mansfield Case Study

Kira Gartzou-Katsouyanni Jose Javier Olivas Osuna Josh De Lyon Kuba Jablonowski Max Kiefel Diane Bolet Alexandra Bulat Mary Kaldor UNDERSTANDING BREXIT IMPACTS AT A LOCAL LEVEL Mansfield case study CONFLICT AND CIVIL SOCIETY RESEARCH UNIT Supported by the LSE Knowledge Exchange and Impact fund SEPTEMBER 2018 Summary of the project and its objectives The UK is in a critical juncture with regard to the process of negotiations to leave the European Union. Important discussions are taking place which will shape the future relation between Britain and the EU. The economic analyses published on the issue have, so far, largely failed to grasp the attention of the general public. Most of the discussions about Brexit have focused at a national level and there has been very little evidence-based discussion at a local level. This project aims at stimulating a reflexive participatory research process involving citizens, policy-makers, business people and civil-society representatives. It introduces an innovative methodology that contextualises quantitative data through expert interviews and the analysis of local sources. The reports and discussion panels organised within the framework of the project seek to increase our understanding about the impact of Brexit at a local level. The Mansfield Brewing Company pub sign Front cover: Clipston Colliery headstocks 1 Understanding Brexit impacts at a local level Mansfield case study This report contributes to the broader research project co-ordinated by the Conflict and Civil Society Research Unit at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE). This study focuses on the perceived impact of Brexit on British local authorities. Five local authority case studies have been selected: Mansfield, Pendle, Ceredigion, Southampton and Barnet. MANSFIELD Executive summary This report examines the likely impact of different the contrary, Brexit may actually exacerbate some of the Brexit scenarios on the economy of Mansfield through challenges that high value-added firms face in the area. four channels: immigration, policies for local economic In order to make the most out of the post-Brexit situation, development, trade and inflation. this report recommends: Mansfield was selected as a case study of a town that 1. that every effort be made to address the major skill has undergone significant industrial restructuring during shortage faced by firms in the Mansfield economy, in the last four decades, following the decline of traditional order to minimise the negative impact of the decrease industries such as coal mining and textiles. Mansfield still in skilled foreign workers that may occur after Brexit; faces acute challenges in terms of attracting high value- 2. that EU funding for regional development be fully added businesses and increasing the skills and earnings replaced by national development programmes, while of the local population. also retaining the best characteristics of EU policies, The share of the Leave vote in the 2016 referendum in such as continuity across time and the empowerment Mansfield was 70.9%, the seventh highest in 382 UK of local and regional stakeholders; local authorities. This outcome can be partly understood 3. that any disturbance to the trade links between in terms of some of the structural characteristics of local companies and the EU be kept to a minimum, the Mansfield economy in the post-coal mining period, especially in sectors that are considered strategically including the spread in the area of a business model that important; has relied on low-skilled, low-paid agency labour, often from other EU countries. 4. and that should the prices of basic goods continue to increase due to Brexit, measures be put in place to Leaving the EU would not in itself provide a durable minimise the impact on the most vulnerable. solution to the area’s long-term structural problems. On Introduction 3 This report examines the likely impact of different Brexit scenarios on the economy of Mansfield. “I think in Mansfield, Brexit has become so toxic and so polarising, that politicians have become genuinely reluctant to mention it.” “Because Brexit is so politicised, businesses are quite reticent to talk about Brexit and its impact publicly (…) It’s a kind of signature issue. People identify with one side or another.” The report draws from a combination of sources, including field found in the Appendix on page 20). The report also draws research conducted in Mansfield with the aim of identifying the from articles in local newspapers, from grey literature about range of context-specific channels through which leaving the EU is Mansfield’s economy and from secondary literature. likely to influence the local economy, as well as quantitative impact Mansfield was selected as a case study of a town that has assessments written at the LSE Centre for Economic Performance undergone significant industrial restructuring during the last (CEP) and the City Region Economic and Development Institute four decades, following the gradual closure of 13 coal pits in (City REDI) of the University of Birmingham. the broader Mansfield area, which employed 16,500 people in The aim of the report is twofold: to increase our knowledge and 1984, and the decline of other traditional industries, such as awareness of the specific types of impact that Brexit is likely textiles and engineering.2 Mansfield also received widespread to have on the local economy of Mansfield; and to encourage attention in June 2017, when Labour lost its local parliamentary constructive, evidence-based, forward-looking discussion seat for the first time since 1923.3 about the issue at local level, overcoming the polarisation that After providing some contextual information about Mansfield many of our interviewees identified as being the dominant and the 2016 vote, this report focuses on the likely effect characteristic of many debates on Brexit at the moment.1 We of Brexit on the local economy through four channels: have strived to achieve the latter by leaving on one side the immigration, policies for local economic development, trade question of whether Brexit was a good or bad idea in the first and inflation. The report argues that the Leave vote in the place, and by focusing instead on strategies to best manage referendum was related to the area’s long-term structural the situation going forward. economic problems. However, we also find that leaving the Engaging with the views of members of the local community EU may not in itself provide a durable solution to the area’s has been crucial in the research process right from the start. long-term structural problems, and could even aggravate some This report draws heavily from the insights that were kindly of them. We identify distinct threats and opportunities that will shared by five representatives of the local business community, arise from Brexit in relation to the challenges that Mansfield’s three representatives of local authorities, one journalist and one economy faces, and present some recommendations for professor, in the context of semi-structured, in-depth interviews making the most out of the situation. conducted in Mansfield (a full list of the interviewees can be 1 The epigraphs above are excerpts from two of the interviews that we conducted in Mansfield. On the emergence of entrenched political identities linked to the way in which people voted in the 2016 EU referendum, see also Hobolt S.B., Leeper T., and Tilley J. 2018. Emerging Brexit identities. In The UK in a Changing Europe (Ed.). Brexit and Public Opinion, pp. 18-20. 2 Department for Communities and Local Government. 2006. The Dynamics of Local Economies and Deprived Neighbourhoods, 187. Available at: http://webarchive. nationalarchives.gov.uk/20120920045319/http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/communities/pdf/150913.pdf. 3 BBC News. 2017. Election 2017: Why did Canterbury and Mansfield switch sides? BBC News online. 9 June. Available at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk- england-40222242. For an excellent analysis of recent political developments in Mansfield, see also: Chaffin J. 2018. Can Jeremy Corbyn restore Labour’s working class vote? Financial Times. 3 June. Available at: https://www.ft.com/content/5822e600-5f55-11e8-ad91-e01af256df68. Local context 4 Mansfield is a local authority of 105,800 inhabitants in Nottinghamshire.4 The majority of the local authority’s population live in the town of Mansfield, which is situated 20km north of Nottingham. Among Mansfield’s economic assets is its central location new jobs were created in the wholesale, between several ‘powerhouses of national productivity’: retail and repair sectors, as well as in Sheffield and Leeds to the north, Manchester and Birmingham comparatively low value-added business 20% to the west and Nottingham and Leicester to the south.5 The services such as labour recruitment and economy of Mansfield itself is highly interlinked with that of the packaging.10 Today, the employment of the working neighbouring local authority, Ashfield, and people in the towns rate in Mansfield is close to the national population of Kirkby-in-Ashfield and Sutton-in-Ashfield in particular ‘look to average. However, median annual earnings qualified at NVQ Mansfield as their town centre’.6 (£15,226) are very low compared to both level 4 or above the national average (£23,349) and the For most of the twentieth century, Mansfield was one of regional average in the East Midlands (£21,172).11 With only the major centres of coal mining in Nottinghamshire. The 20% of

Load more