WE now see unfolding before our eyes the next stage in the demotion of our town and the relegation of our interests behind those of other, largely better-off areas.

It is a fact that GM North (the line of towns stretching from Wigan to Oldham) is economically leagues below GM South: Manchester-Salford and the Cheshire hinterland. We are, in every sense, the poor relations, and are being systematically confirmed in that role. To adapt a phrase from Monty Python: what has Greater Manchester ever done for us? Unfortunately, the answer is, increasingly, no joke.

Whether we have super hospitals is not in itself the issue; where they are to be sited, is. Only one of the four proposed sites is in the poorer (though geographically larger) GM North area; moreover, every single one of the sites chosen is within six miles of Manchester city centre. What happened to the “Greater” bit?

Do we, the 600, 000 inhabitants of Bolton and Wigan, not deserve a super hospital of our own, without having to be driven past our own hospitals to Salford (or Warrington Preston or Liverpool, for parts of Wigan)?

If you live in privileged Didsbury, you are spoilt for choice; if you’re on one of the deprived estates that ring Bolton, pray that you don’t fall seriously ill during the rush hour. Where’s the social justice?

Manchester MPs and Manchester City Council are vociferous about Wythenshawe not being selected – even though no-one in that city will live more than five miles from one of the other sites. Despite suspiciously quick-to-appear assurances to the contrary, the Royal Bolton will, in the long term, effectively be downgraded. What do we hear from our own Council and MPs? Not a peep. We see it again in the proposed removal of court facilities from Bolton, and the acquiescence of the council in the siting of the supposedly “Greater” Manchester enterprise zone: miles away from Bolton, but very convenient for the well-heeled burghers of Cheshire East!

The view of Manchester from George Osborne’s comfortable Tatton seat maybe the hub of a “Northern Powerhouse”; for us, it is, increasingly, the investment black hole that will destroy us, along with much of this region’s traditional heartlands. Other Combined Authorities are more truly regional; a wider view has to be taken here too, before it is too late.

Andrew Bowyer

Bolton