Michael Gove defends £2.1bn 'Levelling Up' as Red Wall Tories claimit is ... trends now

Rishi Sunak's government was forced onto the defensive today as it came under fire from Tory MPs in Red Wall seats who claimed the £2.1billion Levelling-Up fund was biased towards affluent areas in the south east.

Michael Gove insisted that the pot of regeneration cash was 'heavily tilted' towards the North amid claims that areas which voted Tory for the first time in 2019 were missing out.

But just half of the successful bids are in the top 100 most deprived areas of Britain. The Prime Minister's own affluent Richmond constituency in Yorkshire is receiving £19million in funding, with money going to the Catterick Garrison, home to many British Army units, to regenerate the town centre. 

One Tory MP told the Times: 'People are apoplectic. There are some really wealthy areas on the list. It looks awful. It's gone down terribly among red wall MPs.' 

But Mr Gove, the Levelling-Up Secretary, denied that the relatively affluent South East is receiving more levelling up money than communities in the North.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'Well, that's not quite true. If you look at it in terms of the amount of money allocated per person, then it is the case that it's the North West, the North East, Wales, which do best of all.

'London and the South East together constitute a quarter of the country's population.

'There are areas of deprivation in London and in the South East, particularly along the Kent coast, that we do need to invest

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