Bee Network franchised bus services are the most visible example of greater public control of essentials under the ‘Manchesterism’ agenda promoted by Andy Burnham during his time as Mayor of Greater Manchester, a paper by Labour group Mainstream has claimed.
The Productive State: A framework for Manchesterism puts forward a national scaling of the approach, including for transport at city region level. Mr Burnham is a founding member of Mainstream, and his ascendency to Prime Minister now looks inevitable after victory in the Makerfield by-election on 18 June and the resignation of Kier Starmer four days later.
Authored by Mathew Lawrence, a close policy associate of Mr Burnham, The Productive State describes itself as pro-enterprise and says that securing the basics and reducing systemic risk “lowers costs, crowds in investment, and gives firms the stable platform they need to compete, innovate, and grow.”
In May, Mr Burnham told Channel 4 that sectors including energy, housing, transport and water should be put “back under stronger public control.” At the same time, he highlighted change via the Bee Network, claiming that the deregulated alternative “just [works] for… private shareholders and not for the paying public.”
The now-former Mayor of Greater Manchester has made no comment on potential for still wider public control of bus services in England should he become Prime Minister. The Bus Services Act 2025 expanded the powers of local authorities, including strengthened scope for franchising and a removal of the longstanding ban on new municipal operators.
The Productive State notes how the Bee Network “has begun to show what the logic of public control produces in practice: lower fares, more routes, restored connectivity to communities the market had written off, and the fastest-growing city economy in Britain.”
A lower overall system cost is claimed by Mr Lawrence, although the expense and long-term financial sustainability of the Bee Network has been the subject of some debate.
“The Bee Network is not a subsidy to inefficiency. It is the removal of a structural bias against provision that is socially necessary but privately marginal,” the document continues. “Its success has prompted other combined authorities to follow the same path.”
