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What can we take from this for UK policy: 1) Getting big cities going really matters not just for them but also for the surrounding region. Burnham's growth agenda must take this into account. 2) But for the surrounding towns to benefit we need more transport infrastructure.

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What enabled all of this to happen: 1) A new source of labour demand from Luxembourg 2) Transport connectivity - People in France had to be able to get to these jobs. Fortunately, in 1981, a new motorway was built between France and Luxembourg City, and today 50% of commuters use it every day

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The paper also shows that economic revitalisation impacted politics in these areas too. Areas closer to Luxembourg saw a much smaller vote share for the far right National Rally party, and much greater support for EU integration

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Who benefitted from this? Local people. The vast majority of people who took new better paid jobs in Luxembourg were born in the French "rust belt". People of all educational backgrounds. It wasn't just graduates getting new jobs but also school leavers.

What did these commuting flows do to nearby French towns. Well areas nearer Luxembourg now have a: 1) Higher employment rate - mostly in services jobs 2) Higher wages overall and for the average worker. 3) Lower welfare dependance

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Meanwhile nearby French towns were suffering with deindustrialisation, between 1975 and 1982, the number of manufacturing jobs fell by 26.5 percent within 50km of Luxembourg. But Luxembourg provided new opportunities for local workers and fast forward to now, many French workers commute in.

Similarly to the surrounding areas in France and Germany Luxembourg was a manufacturing hub up until the 1980s. But with the liberalisation of financial regulation in the 1980s it became an EU hub for financial services. This provided a new growth engine for its economy

Labour Climate and Environment Forum @lcefuk.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

How can we revitalise post-industrial towns and fight the far right? A new academic paper from UC Berkley shows how the development of Luxembourg as a financial centre also boosted the economy and reduced the vote share for the National Rally in nearby ex-manufacturing towns in France.

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Our panel on public ownership of the water industry has just kicked off - join us and @GoodGrowthFdn.bsky.social to unpack the options! We're expecting heated debate over this issue.

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Labour Climate and Environment Forum @lcefuk.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

Public ownership, tighter regulation, or regional mutuals? 💧 The government has committed to putting the water industry back in the public interest - now the real policy battle is deciding what that model looks like. Watch highlights from our panel, co-hosted with @goodgrowthfdn.bsky.social.

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Dan Mead @danmead.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

I'll also be speaking on a joint @thinklabour.bsky.social and @cmmonwealth.bsky.social panel on the politics of public control We'll have my old boss @jonashworth.bsky.social, Mat Lawrence, Hannah Peaker of NEF, and @clairehanna.bsky.social ⏰ Monday 11 - 12 📍Arena Room Aire

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Dan Mead @danmead.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

Hope to see people at Labour Party Conference - I'll be speaking on a panel hosted by @lcefuk.bsky.social and @goodgrowthfdn.bsky.social on who controls our water!

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sianushka.bsky.social @sianushka.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

This all tracks as a Bristolian, although it's ironic that voters fed up with housing issues are switching to Green considering their track record on housing.

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Christabel Cooper @christabelcoops.bsky.social · 17/09/2026

Our @thinklabour.bsky.social report on the Greens challenge to Labour is in the Guardian today. Our diagnosis of why Labour's vote fell in cities is high housing costs for young people, plus progressives worried that Labour doesn't reflects their values. www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

theguardian.com

Greens just four points behind Labour in urban areas, poll reveals

Exclusive: UK’s Green parties could take 40 seats if result replicated at next election, according to Labour-linked thinktank

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Labour needs a more aggressive approach through densification, brownfield development and transport-led growth. Labour also needs to give mayors the powers and incentives to build more houses. But we cannot devolve and forget. If cities do not rise to the challenge, Whitehall should force them to.

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And fortunately for Labour, building new homes in cities is popular. Our polling found 60% of voters in major city centres support new housing near them, compared to only 46% in other areas.

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The only way to reconstruct the social contract for all is by building more houses. Austin and Auckland are two cities where building has driven down rents, including for low income households, and where progressives have retained power.

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And this is driving voters away from Labour. Voters who have a mortgage or rent (and therefore are exposed to the high housing costs), are much more likely to switch to vote for the Green Party.

For graduates, the social contract can feel broken. They worked hard but now struggle with high living costs, leaving the traditional markers of success out of reach. And Bristol natives feel like they get a raw deal. They feel pushed out rather than benefiting from its economic strength.

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But housing supply hasn't kept up, pushing house prices and rents up, with growth in Bristol far above the UK average. And in extremis, the housing crisis ends up as homelessness. According to Shelter 1 out of 113 people are homeless in Bristol, well above the national average .

Bristol has a fast growing economy, and a high number of high productivity jobs. At the centre of this success is the expansion of higher education since 2000. Many students choose to stay after graduation, meaning Bristol's population has gone up by 20% over the last 25 years.

Economic insecurity is driving voters away from Labour. It is no surprise that Britain's least affordable city for renters, Bristol, has both a Green council and a Green MP Now our new polling shows Labour is more likely to lose voters in big cities who are financially struggling.

Dan Mead @danmead.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Bristol has a fast growing economy. So why does Labour face electoral danger in the city? Our new polling shows that Labour is losing a crucial set of voters in big cities: those that feel like they are financially struggling. Why are they financially struggling? Housing. A thread 🧵:

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I'm in the Future of the Left's essay collection on "re-industrialising Britain" as a bit of a dissenting voice. If we're looking at what the future for our post-industrial town could be, I think we should look at examples in our own country. Places like Reading and Swindon:

Dan Mead @danmead.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Connectivity rather than a return of manufacturing is how we can heal the scars of deindustrialisation in our post industrial towns - my piece in response to @ben-glover.bsky.social futureoftheleft.substack.com/p/connecting...

futureoftheleft.substack.com

Connecting post-industrial towns

A series on the politics of production.

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Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan @london.gov.uk · 19/08/2026

This stopped me in my tracks. An independent study by @qmul.bsky.social has found that after ULEZ was introduced, children’s lungs grew faster in Central London and have now caught up with children outside of the capital. Incredible.

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ThinkLabour @thinklabour.bsky.social · 04/08/2026

Keeping test fees artificially low might sound like it helps with the cost of living. In reality, it leaves learners paying far more in extra lessons, lost opportunities, and even scalpers. Our polling suggests the public is more pragmatic than politicians assume.

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ThinkLabour @thinklabour.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

Who is Labour for? With a new PM stepping into number 10 on Monday, that question has never been more important. At ThinkLabour, we’re keeping it front and centre. Yesterday we sat down with the Deputy Leader of the Labour party, Lucy Powell, to tackle it head on.

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Lots more detail in the paper, very hard to capture nuances in even handful of posts

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Oh yeah absolutely, I don’t think I’m the long term they are contradictory. Better connectivity would help the manufacturing industry and bring more jobs to places. But in the short term there is a prioritisation question: do you go for subsidies for manufacturing or transport investment

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They think they have a good idea of a Con 2019 Lab 2024 voter in a town like Burnley. But people do really contain multitudes.

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Some of it is also that the world is messy and similarly to how the public want politicians to fit stereotypes, politicos want the general public to fit a set of archetypes.