'Mindset shift' needed within government on No10 North, says deputy
Parish's choice of words is telling. "Institutional barriers" sounds like the polite civil service phrase for any number of frustrations, from budget approvals to the simple gravitational pull of London meetings and ministerial diaries. When the person running a flagship programme says that on the record, it reads as a warning sign that the policy is far from settled.
What matters is that an insider is telling us plainly that the government's own decentralisation drive is bumping up against the machine it is trying to change. Moving desks north is the easy part; shifting how decisions get made and how talent grows outside the capital takes years. Whether Number 10 North becomes a genuine hub or quietly fades into a satellite office depends on whether anyone with power takes the mindset point seriously.