Mike Starkie for Mayor of Cumbria

20/10/2026

17/10/2026

Out and about with the team leafleting in Penrith this fine Saturday morning

16/10/2026

A DECADE OF LOST OPPORTUNITY, BUT CUMBRIA’S BEST DAYS LIE AHEAD

Cumbria is facing one of the greatest economic opportunities in its modern history. But we also need to be honest about the consequences of arriving late to devolution.

Cumbria could have been a pioneer of devolution ten years ago, alongside Greater Manchester, Liverpool, the West Midlands and Tees Valley.

I voted for that opportunity and have continued to argue for a Cumbrian mayor and meaningful devolution ever since, including at times when it was not necessarily the politically easiest position for a Conservative candidate to take.

Indeed, I have previously said that even a Labour mayor would have been better for Cumbria than having no mayor at all.

The devolution proposal rejected by our Labour and Lib Dem councillors leaders a decade ago would have provided £300 million over 30 years. In today’s money, that is approximately £423 million - around £90 million more than the £333 million deal Cumbria has now accepted.

But the real cost of that decision goes far beyond the difference between the two headline figures.

Cumbria has spent the intervening decade excluded from funding, powers and investment opportunities available only to mayoral combined authorities. Even at the most recent Budget, £13 billion was made available to seven established combined authorities, while a further eleven areas shared £900 million from an infrastructure fund that Cumbria, without a mayoral authority, was unable to access.

We cannot know precisely how much investment Cumbria might have secured over those ten years, but it is clear that the cost of arriving late runs into hundreds of millions of pounds.

That lost opportunity cannot now be recovered.

I also opposed the decision to delay the mayoral election until May 2027.

The justification was that holding the mayoral and council elections together would save approximately £1 million. That is short-term thinking. The first mayor could instead have been elected in 2026 with an initial five-year term, allowing future mayoral and council elections to be aligned without leaving Cumbria without elected leadership during this crucial period.

There was also an obvious political calculation. Labour and Liberal Democrat council leaders knew that an election in 2026 would have taken place in a very different political climate.

Whatever the motivation, Cumbria is now in the extraordinary position of having a Mayoral Combined Authority but no elected mayor.

Along with Cheshire and Warrington, we are one of only two areas where a Mayoral Combined Authority has become operational before its mayor has been elected.

Significant decisions are already being made, including proposed investments of £5 million in the Workington Sports Village and £4 million connected to the Tour de France. Yet the person who will ultimately be accountable to the public for the Combined Authority’s direction has not been elected and is not present when those decisions are taken.

At precisely the moment when the Government is developing new arrangements for business-rate retention and a share of income-tax revenues, Cumbria has no elected mayor at the negotiating table.

That matters.

The established mayoral authorities have spent years building the finance teams, investment pipelines, borrowing relationships and delivery capacity needed to use these powers effectively. Cumbria’s first mayor will inherit a live organisation, existing commitments and major decisions already taken.

The Combined Authority is already receiving half of the first year’s £11 million allocation under the devolution deal. It was also provided with approximately £2 million to establish the new authority and will receive around £2.9 million a year for three years towards its running costs.

That money should be used to make sure the mayor does not begin from a standing start. But preparation must not become a substitute for democratic accountability.

My first job if I am elected as mayor would therefore be to establish exactly what has been committed, how the money has been allocated, what is working, what needs to change and what team Cumbria needs to deliver.

I would then make the immediate case to Government for a fiscal settlement built specifically for Cumbria.

The proposal to retain a share of income tax is welcome, but it will naturally have a much greater impact in large urban areas. Greater Manchester has a working population approaching two million, compared with approximately 300,000 in Cumbria.

Cumbria therefore needs a settlement that reflects the distinctive strengths of our economy.

There is a compelling case for us to retain a proportion of the VAT generated by our visitor economy. Around 20 million people visit Cumbria each year, generating an estimated £900 million in VAT receipts while placing real demands on our roads, communities, public services and infrastructure.

Real devolution cannot mean copying and pasting a Manchester or London model onto Cumbria. It must reflect our economy, our geography and our opportunities.

Business-rate retention should also be central to our settlement.

I pursued business-rate retention when I was Mayor of Copeland, but we were not selected for the pilot because we were not part of a Mayoral Combined Authority.

Cumbria is particularly well placed to benefit from retaining more of the business rates generated here. We have two globally significant anchor employers in Sellafield and BAE Systems. Sellafield is one of the largest business-rate contributors in the country, second only to Heathrow Airport.

That provides a degree of stability while creating enormous opportunities for a growth-focused economy across advanced manufacturing, defence, clean energy, tourism, food production, textiles and our rural economy.

The £8.4 billion submarine investment announced in Barrow demonstrates what can be achieved when government, industry and local partners align behind a common purpose.

Credit is due to former Conservative MP Simon Fell, who was one of the first to champion the whole-government approach that developed into Team Barrow.

Barrow has been given a once-in-a-generation opportunity. Submarine building will provide skilled and well-paid employment for decades and support tens of thousands of jobs across the wider national supply chain.

However, Team Barrow and Barrow Rising also demonstrate why Cumbria needs strong and directly accountable leadership.

Progress has been slower than many local people expected. Too much of the early promise has been held back by bureaucracy, fragmented decision-making and a lack of strategic coordination.

There is also an increasing perception that funding intended to transform Barrow’s economy is being used to compensate for shortcomings in routine local-government responsibilities. Transformational investment should not become a substitute for maintaining council assets or delivering basic public services.

A mayor should provide the strategic direction, bring partners together, remove obstacles and ensure that investment leaves a lasting economic legacy.

That legacy must reach beyond Barrow.

As mayor, I would establish a county-wide investment strategy covering housing, transport, infrastructure, connectivity and skills. It would harness Barrow’s defence-led growth while unlocking the strengths of west Cumbria, Carlisle, the Eden Valley, South Lakes, the Furness peninsula and our rural and coastal communities.

Every part of Cumbria deserves the opportunity to grow.

I am also the only candidate who has committed to introducing neither a mayoral council-tax precept nor a tourist tax.

My approach is to bring investment into Cumbria, not taxes onto Cumbrians.

I have spent years building and running businesses, creating jobs and carrying the responsibility of ensuring there was enough money in the bank to meet the payroll.

I understand that every additional cost placed on a business can affect its ability to invest, employ another person or increase someone’s wages.

As Mayor of Copeland, I balanced the books, kept council tax down, secured major investment and protected and improved frontline services. We did that without borrowing money and left the council with zero debt from my eight year tenure..

That experience taught me to respect every pound of public money and never forget that every pound spent by government first had to be earned by an individual or a business.

My priority would be to use the new powers available to the mayor to improve transport and infrastructure, help businesses grow, create good jobs and give young people more opportunities to build their futures here.

If we grow the economy successfully and retaining more locally generated tax means Cumbria has more money than it needs to deliver those priorities, local people should share in that success.

That could mean further investment in projects that generate growth. It could also mean reducing the burden on hardworking Cumbrian families by returning money to taxpayers.

The important point is that those decisions should be made in Cumbria, by people accountable to Cumbrians, rather than dictated by Whitehall.

The frustration is that Cumbria could have begun this journey ten years ago. The financial offer was better, and as one of the pioneering areas we could have shaped the future of devolution rather than joining the process at the back of the queue.

We have endured a decade of missed opportunities and lost investment.

But devolution still gives us the best opportunity in generations to modernise our economy, attract investment and ensure that more of the wealth created here benefits the people who live here.

The question now is what is being done to ensure Cumbria’s mayor can begin delivering from the first day in office.

The election date is set for 6 May 2027. However, should a general election be called before then, there would be a strong case for holding the mayoral election on the same day. That would provide Cumbria with its elected leader sooner and would almost certainly produce a substantially higher turnout.

Whatever happens, preparation cannot wait until May 2027.

I have been preparing for this opportunity since 2016. Cumbria may have arrived late, but with the right leadership, ambition and fiscal settlement, I remain convinced that our best days lie ahead.

16/10/2026

KEEPING TAXES DOWN IS NOT JUST WHAT I AM PROMISING, IT IS EXACTLY WHAT I DID IN MY EIGHT YEARS AS MAYOR OF COPELAND

The first three years of Labour-run Cumberland and Lib Dem-run Westmorland & Furness councils have seen council tax increase by 15.73%, inflation over that exact timespan was 8.97%. They are increasing your council tax by nearly double the rate of inflation.

Over my full two terms as Mayor of Copeland council tax increased by 14.47%, inflation over that exact timespan was 30.14%. Council tax went up by less than half the rate of inflation. In real terms that is a significant reduction in council tax, which is why Copeland went from having the highest council tax in Cumbria in 2015 to one of the lowest by 2023.

It was not just council tax kept lower, but fees and charges too. For example, crematorium charges in the first three years of the new council have risen at an average 3.41% annually more than double the average annual increase throughout my two terms of 1.68%.

In the first three years of Cumberland car parking charges have increased by between 17% and 22% again more than double the rate of inflation.

Over my entire time as Mayor, car parking charges were frozen and had a 0% increase, taking inflation into account that was a significant reduction in car parking charges.

This is replicated across the whole range of fees and charges applied by the council; they have gone up around double the rate of inflation while for my eight years as Mayor the were kept down at less than half the rate of inflation.

That is delivering more and charging less.

During the first three years of Cumberland and despite the massive increases in taxes and fees and charges, they have increased the eye watering debt they inherited from the Labour run Cumbria County council by another £11m to £262m and they still need to find millions of pounds more to balance the budget.

During my eight years as Mayor of Copeland we paid off the inherited debt overspend of £13.2m from Labour, absorbed £24m in central government funding cuts, yet we never borrowed any money and never incurred a single penny of debt.

In Copeland we increased staff numbers, we invested millions of pounds into improving and increasing services notably waste and recycling, bereavement services and our unique social inclusion programme and brought in unprecedented levels of investment.

We significantly increased the council’s assets and massively reduced its liabilities, most notably by buying out the PFI in a deal worth £25 million to council taxpayers.

If elected Mayor of Cumbria my focus will be on bringing investment into Cumbria not taxes onto Cumbrians.

15/10/2026

Party Leader approval ratings have KemiBadenoch on an all time high - and the only leader going in the right direction with an increase!

Kemi’s conference speech has also led to the Conservatives overtaking Reform in the post conference polling.

Will Burnham’s stay in the positives after the incoming budget?

14/10/2026

My interest and subsequent involvment in local politics is largely inspired by my Dad (Maurice Starkie), his trade union background and how he for all his working life championed local employment, giving job opportunities to countless local people(back in an era when choosing not to work was not a lifestyle choice).

Below is the story of how my Dad along with his trade union colleague Eddie Brenan led on the historic productivity deal which gained national recognition for changing how industrial relations operated on a large chemical site

My own goal in local politics is to create better opportunities for Cumbria and Cumbrian people is more than just a passion, it’s in my DNA

HOW MARCHON DEAL SHAPED INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS IN WHITEHAVEN

During the late 1960s and early 1970s, Marchon Chemical Works in Whitehaven (then operating as the Marchon Division of Albright & Wilson) entered into pioneering, comprehensive productivity agreements with its trade unions.

At the time, the UK chemical industry faced severe pressure to modernize, reduce systematic overtime, and eliminate rigid trade demarcations.

The Marchon productivity deal achieved nationwide recognition for changing how industrial relations operated on a major chemical site.

The core elements of the agreement included:

1. The Consolidation of Pay and Ending "Overtime Culture"

• High Base Rates for Less Hours: The deal eliminated the heavy reliance on systematic overtime, which workers had previously used to boost their income

• Annual Salaries: Instead of unpredictable hourly wages plus overtime, manual and process operators were moved onto stable, much higher consolidated annual salaries or flat-rate weekly pay scales.

2. Radical Flexibility and Inter-Union Demarcation Changes

• Breakdown of Craft Barriers: Prior to the agreement, strict jurisdictional boundaries separated what different trades could do (e.g., an electrician could not touch a minor mechanical component).

• Job Flexibility: The trade unions (representing both general process operators and skilled craft unions) agreed to extensive flexibility and multi-skilling. Maintenance workers learned elements of other trades, and process operators took on minor, routine engineering and maintenance tasks to minimize plant downtime.

3. Shift Pattern Optimizations

• Continuous Operations: As Europe’s largest single-site sulfuric acid producer, Marchon required round-the-clock operation. The agreement optimized continuous shift patterns to ensure the capital-intensive kilns and chemical plants could run at maximum capacity without requiring ad-hoc overtime scheduling.

4. Financial and Local Economic Impact

• The "Golden Mile": In return for giving up restrictive work practices, Marchon workers secured some of the highest industrial wages in the region. This injected massive spending power into West Cumbria, famously turning Whitehaven's King Street into what locals nicknamed the "Golden Mile" due to the high disposable income of the plant's 2,500+ workers.
The Marchon deals became a prominent case study of "productivity bargaining," showing that unions and management could cooperate to swap strict work rules for high, guaranteed wages and modern work conditions.

Maurice Starkie was a critically important local figure who served as the Joint Trade Union Committee Chairman and Convenor at the Whitehaven site. As the primary workforce representative during this transition, his leadership was essential in ensuring the historic productivity deal was both negotiated and successfully adopted by a highly unionised workforce.
His role in the negotiations was defined by several key contributions:

1. Unifying a Fragmented Union Front

Before the late 1960s, negotiations at Marchon were highly fragmented because workers were split across multiple different unions, separating general process operators from various skilled engineering and craft unions.
Maurice Starkie spearheaded a joint-union approach. By bringing the disparate factions under a single Joint Trade Union Committee, he prevented management from playing different unions against one another and ensured the workforce bargained as a unified bloc.

2. Overcoming Workforce Resistance to "Demarcation" Changes

The most controversial element of the productivity deal for the workers was the elimination of traditional trade boundaries (demarcations) and the introduction of flexibility. Many skilled tradesmen feared that allowing process operators to do minor maintenance would dilute their craft or threaten jobs. Starkie used his considerable personal influence and credibility on the shop floor to convince reluctant workers that trading rigid work rules for guaranteed high salaries and job security was a win for the long-term future of the workforce.

3. Pioneering "Productivity Bargaining"

Starkie was a pragmatist who understood that the "overtime culture" of the postwar British industry was unsustainable and that the plant needed to modernize to survive. Rather than engaging in traditional adversarial striking, he practiced productivity bargaining—willingly putting archaic working practices on the table as a leverage tool to demand top-tier corporate status, annual salaries, and excellent pension schemes for his members.

4. Securing the "Golden Mile" Wages

His tough stance during the final rounds of the late 60s/early 70s negotiations directly resulted in the exceptionally high consolidated salary rates. This successful negotiation gave Marchon workers the formidable spending power that famously drove Whitehaven's local economy during that era.
Through his ability to balance radical workplace reform with fierce protection of worker income, Maurice Starkie's leadership became widely cited as a model for how industrial relations could modernize peacefully in the UK chemical sector.

Following his monumental work negotiating the historic late 1960s and early 1970s productivity deals at Marchon, Maurice Starkie remained a central pillar of industrial relations, community advocacy, and grassroots political activism in West Cumbria.
Because of the massive footprint Marchon had on Whitehaven's economy, his leadership transitioned smoothly into lifelong local advocacy:

A Lasting Family Legacy in West Cumbrian Politics

Maurice Starkie's approach to local advocacy left a multi-generational legacy in Whitehaven. His son, Mike Starkie, went on to become an equally influential figure in Cumbrian politics, serving for eight years as the first and only Directly Elected Mayor of Copeland from 2015 until the council's reorganization. While Mike operated under a different political philosophy (initially elected as an Independent before later joining the Conservatives), he has frequently credited his father Maurice's deep-rooted industrial union background and fierce West Cumbrian pride as the inspiration behind his own career in public service.

Maurice Starkie is remembered in Whitehaven as one of the key architects of the town's mid-century economic prosperity, proving that a strong trade union leader could fundamentally modernise industrial relations while ensuring workers shared in the factory's financial success.

His transition into construction as a General Foreman for Balfour Beatty perfectly matches the ethos he established during his time as a union convenor. Rather than just negotiating from afar, he was directly on the ground creating tangible opportunities. By actively championing and securing employment for local West Cumbrian workers on major civil engineering and infrastructure projects, he ensured that the local economy directly benefited from big corporate contracts.

His support for Whitehaven Rugby League Football Club (WRLFC) highlights how deeply woven he was into the social fabric of the town. In the era of semi-professional rugby league, players absolutely depended on securing stable, physically accommodating day jobs to sustain their playing careers. By deliberately providing employment to WRLFC players on his construction sites, among the many players for whom Maurice secured employment were GB internationals Mark Beckwith, Jimmy Dalton and Vince Gribbin and long serving former club captain the late Billy Fisher.

Maurice wasn't just a fan in the stands; he was anchoring the club's talent pool and helping local athletes provide for their families.

It cements his legacy as a true grassroots champion who used his professional influence to look out for Whitehaven people in every way he could.

Eddie Brenan also played an absolute key role in the landmark Marchon productivity deals, standing alongside Maurice Starkie as a driving force behind the union negotiations.

As a highly influential trade union organiser for the EEPTU (Electrical, Electronic, Telecommunications and Plumbing Union), Brenan was a central figure in West Cumbria's industrial relations during this era. At a time when the Marchon chemical works was expanding rapidly into a massive manufacturing hub, the factory floor was heavily unionised across different trades.

Brenan’s specific impact came from several crucial factors:

• The "Dual-Leadership" Dynamic:
While Maurice Starkie was highly visible on the general transport and general workers' side (TGWU), Brenan represented the skilled electrical and technical trades. For a complex productivity deal to succeed, general workers and highly skilled tradesmen had to form a united front. Brenan’s leadership ensured the skilled workforce bought into the restructured working terms.

• Negotiating Radical Changes:
The late 1960s and early 1970s deals were revolutionary because they swapped old, rigid "demarcation" rules (where only certain people could touch certain machines) for flexible working, higher productivity, and significantly higher base salaries. Brenan was known as a sharp, formidable negotiator who ensured his members were highly compensated for giving up traditional work practices.

• A Community Titan:
Beyond the factory gates, Brenan was a household name in Whitehaven. He balanced his major union responsibilities with playing professional rugby league, later serving as a local magistrate, a Copeland district councillor, and a personnel manager for Border TV.

His reputation in local history is that of a tough, fair, and incredibly effective "homegrown" leader who used the Marchon deals to fundamentally elevate the standard of living for working-class families across Kells, Mirehouse, and the wider Whitehaven area.

14/10/2026

My column in this weeks local press

Eleven years after Copeland voted for an Elected Mayor, it is easy to forget the public dissatisfaction and parlous financial state of the failing council I inherited.

In 2014/15, the annual budget was £11.249 million, with 40% of that relying on central government funding.

Upon taking office, I faced a staggering £13.2 million overspend: more than 100% of the entire annual budget.

This was compounded by central government funding being phased out entirely because of the shocking state of the nation’s finances it had taken on, and the council had a revolving door of expensive agency consultants filling key roles.

If that was not bad enough, we faced three unprecedented crisis that could have bankrupted any local authority:

1. The Sellafield rates appeal: Wiped out our reserves by forcing a £12.6 million refund, requiring us to negotiate a £2.9 million government debt write-off to avoid bankruptcy.

2. A devastating inter-state cyber-attack: Crippled our internal networks, requiring a massive recovery effort that was later recognized nationally by the LGA.

3. The COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2015, Copeland residents paid the highest council tax in Cumbria. I promised to change that.

Throughout my 8 years in office, council tax, fees, and charges rose at less than half the rate of inflation. By 2023 Copeland had one of the lowest rates of council tax in Cumbria.

Contrast that with the current Cumbrian councils, who since their inception have raised taxes and fees by nearly double inflation.

We delivered a total financial turnaround.

We paid off the £13.2 million overspend, bought the council out of a crippling PFI in a deal worth £25 million to taxpayers, and replaced government funding with self-generated revenues.

We virtually wiped out the council's debts, balanced the budget every year, and borrowed absolutely nothing and incurred zero debt.

Furthermore, we ended the costly agency culture by hiring full-time staff, and dramatically improving core services like waste, recycling, planning and bereavement services.

Again, contrast this with the current councils making hundreds of workers redundant.

Over my two terms, more than £300 million of investment poured into Copeland to fund vital regeneration projects, many of which are still coming to fruition today.

As they say, success has many fathers, while failure is an orphan. And it’s remarkable how many of today’s politicians turn up for the photographs and selfie-videos once the hard work is done.

The value of the council assets on the balance sheet increased from £22m to £38m during my term of office.

Today's Cumbrian councils are drowning in nearly half a billion pounds of debt and borrowing even more just to balance their day-to-day books.

I have embraced and championed devolution for more than a decade, it is Cumbria’s greatest economic opportunity and its potential needs to be understood to be delivered.

Labour and Lib Dems’ lack of foresight has already cost us tens of millions by blocking devolution for the last 10 years until their hand was forced.

My definitive aim if elected mayor of Cumbria is to bring investment into Cumbria, not taxes onto Cumbrians.

I have done it before and I am ready to do it again.

13/10/2026

Kemi Badenoch's Tories are just one point behind Labour in a bombshell new poll.

The latest YouGov survey puts Andy Burnham's party in the lead with 24%, down three points from the week before. 📉

But the Conservatives are up three points to 23% in an apparent bounce after the party's conference.

Nigel Farage's Reform UK is third with 21%, down one point from the previous week.

Meanwhile, the Lib Dems are up one point on 12%, and the Greens are unchanged on 11% after Zack Polanski failed to win a crunch by-election in Sir Keir Starmer's former seat.

Anthony Wells, global head of politics, elections and public data at YouGov, said the changes were within the margin of error.

But he said it appeared the Tories had benefited from a “conference bounce”.

He said: “It may well be a temporary boost, but this is the first time that we have had Reform in third place since 2024."

Mrs Badenoch used the Conservative conference to announce that she would scrap inheritance tax on family homes if her party wins power.

She also again ruled out a pact with Reform at the next general election in her strongest comments to date.

The Tory leader said: “To those who say ‘unite the right’, we are not uniting with that.”

YouGov polled 2,393 people between October 11 and 12.