{"id":1052810,"date":"2026-06-27T05:07:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T05:07:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1052810\/"},"modified":"2026-06-27T05:07:28","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T05:07:28","slug":"holyrood-powers-under-threat-from-andy-burnhams-plan-to-boost-scottish-cities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1052810\/","title":{"rendered":"Holyrood powers under threat from Andy Burnham’s plan to boost Scottish cities"},"content":{"rendered":"

One insider asked: ‘If we have metro mayors for Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Dundee, would there be any need for Holyrood?’\"Andy<\/p>\n

Andy Burnham arrives at Westminster on Monday after Keir Starmer announced he was resigning as Prime Minister(Image: Tolga Akmen\/EPA\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n

Prime Minister-in-waiting Andy Burnham<\/a> has got a long-term plan to “encourage” the Scottish Government to devolve power to city regions.<\/p>\n

It could see the introduction of the Scottish equivalent of ‘Metro Mayors’ for Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Dundee, taking back many of the powers centralised by the SNP at Holyrood.<\/p>\n

His proposal has already won the backing of Susan Aitken, the SNP leader of Glasgow City Council. Writing in the Herald on Friday, she said Mr Burnham’s elevation to No.10 “could be the game changer that unlocks a fair deal for Glasgow and our fellow Celtic city regions”.<\/p>\n

One well-connected Glasgow insider told the Express that the creation of a directly-elected leader for the entire city region would be the biggest change to the Scottish political landscape since devolution in 1999.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

OPINION<\/p>\n

The source said: “Were he to grant that, presumably Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Dundee would want the same. If that came to pass would there be any need for Holyrood? After all, Westminster would be supplying the cash for city devolution. We wouldn’t need three layers of government.”<\/p>\n

The Glasgow city region is home to around 1.75million people and includes the likes of Paisley, East Kilbride, Hamilton and Cumbernauld. And there have been calls for the creation of a Glasgow ‘Metro Mayor’ for years, following the likes of Greater Manchester, Merseyside and the West Midlands in England.<\/p>\n

\"City<\/p>\n

City Chambers in George Square, Glasgow(Image: Getty Images)<\/p>\n

While he was the mayor of Greater Manchester, Mr Burnham wrote a book with Steve Rotheram<\/a>, the mayor of the Liverpool city region. Published in 2024, Head North is likely to form part of his blueprint as the next UK Labour leader and Prime Minister.<\/p>\n

In it, he said: “I do think it is important to encourage Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to pass down more of the devolved powers they hold to their towns and cities. In Scotland in particular, power has been drawn out of its regions and up into the national level.<\/p>\n

“This can be seen, for instance, in the centralisation of the police and fire services. In the UK context, when all dialogue between Scotland and England is conducted through Holyrood and Westminster, it becomes inevitably tense and political.<\/p>\n

“If we can imagine a world where Greater Manchester and the Liverpool City Region can collaborate with a Greater Glasgow with similar powers, or the new North East Combined Authority doing the same with Edinburgh and Dundee, it would make the UK a more practical, positive place.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One insider asked: ‘If we have metro mayors for Glasgow, Edinburgh, Aberdeen and Dundee, would there be any…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1052811,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[7826],"tags":[1006,8916,748,18866,1102,918,10650,4884,26655,2465,712,10004,16,10788,102596,15],"class_list":["post-1052810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-glasgow","tag-aberdeen","tag-andy-burnham","tag-britain","tag-dundee","tag-edinburgh","tag-glasgow","tag-glasgow-city-council","tag-great-britain","tag-holyrood","tag-manchester","tag-scotland","tag-snp","tag-uk","tag-uk-government","tag-uk-labour","tag-united-kingdom"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116820341705229191","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1052810"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1052810\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1052811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1052810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1052810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1052810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}