Co-production at the heart of local leadership: Interview with Michael Mordey, Leader of Sunderland City Council

In this interview, LGIU’s Chief Executive, Jonathan Carr-West, sits down with Michael Mordey, Leader of Sunderland City Council, to discuss his lifelong commitment to Sunderland, the challenges of austerity, inclusive regeneration, neighbourhood co-production, long-term ambitions for opportunity, and the importance of effective regional devolution.

You can watch the interview on YouTube here:

Timestamps:
01:32 Michael’s vision as leader of Sunderland
02:56 Michael’s journey into local government
04:42 Honest conversations in times of austerity
08:54 Delivering regernation for lasting change
11:44 Engaging with communities during change
12:37 How Sunderland’s area committees work
14:24 The success of Sunderland’s area committees
16:29 Co-producing council services
18:36 Empowering your community through engagement
21:45 Measuring community impact
24:09 Sundlerand as a place with opportunity for all
27:17 Grasping the opportunity of devolution

Looking for just the highlights? A written version of the interview has been edited down into a Q&A format, which you can read below.

Councillor Mordey, you’ve lived and worked in Sunderland your whole life. How has that shaped your vision for the city and your approach to leadership?

I think for me, I’m proud to be from Sunderland. I’m born and bred here. My family’s lived here for multiple generations. So when I had the opportunity to join the council way back in 2008, it was about a sense of wanting to do my bit to, first and foremost, help my local area.

I’ve represented the council for many years. As I said, it’s where I was born, bred, and where my family still lives today. It was always about my desire to do my bit: to join in, to add my voice, to try and improve things for the local area. As I’ve moved up through the ranks at the council, I’ve been able to use that passion for the city to help drive some of the economic regeneration we’re now seeing in Sunderland. So it’s a very proud moment for me – for a young lad from Hendon, growing up in a single-parent family – to get this opportunity to lead my city. I’m very proud.

There are lots of ways in which people can serve their area. What drew you to the council as the institution, as the vehicle for delivering that sense of wanting to help your community?

I’ve always been someone who’s been willing to stand up, say things, and challenge those in power. All the way back from school, I was my form’s rep because it was me they would push forward to say, “We don’t agree with this, Michael – do you want to go and tell the teachers and try to find a solution for us?”

I got my start in local politics through one of the last Labour government’s New Deal for Communities projects. I was a young person’s rep on the Back on the Map board when I was 16. I’m a big believer in fate, and just by chance, when I graduated from university, there was a vacancy in the local ward for the City Council. I was approached by the party to consider standing, and that was my opportunity to join the council.

But really, it was a passion for my local area. I had a small profile through Back on the Map, but fundamentally it was fate – a vacancy came up on the council at exactly the right time.

How have you seen the local government sector change its approach to neighbourhood working over that time, and what were the lessons and observations you were forming as you went through that career?

I think my whole time on the council has really been shaped by austerity. When I first joined, we were just hitting the financial crisis, and in 2010 Gordon Brown’s government lost the election, ushering in the coalition government, which embarked on a whole period of austerity. Things fundamentally had to change because we were hit by budget cut after budget cut after budget cut, so we had to reshape how we delivered a whole host of services.

The impacts of austerity were really striking, particularly in the first couple of years of the coalition government. I remember one year – just after I became a cabinet member in 2014–2015 – I had to take £42 million out of the budget in a single year. I was the city services cabinet member at the time, responsible for environment, transport, planning, and a lot of frontline services: the things that people see, feel, and use every day. Everyone gets their bins collected. Everyone drives on the roads. Everyone sees potholes. Everyone uses the parks and open spaces. And we simply couldn’t provide the level of service we used to.

I often use this quote: people were demanding in 2015, 2016, and even now in 2025, 2010 levels of service on 2025 budget and staffing levels. That’s been extremely difficult. As a council, we tried our utmost to make cuts in the back office, not the frontline, but inevitably, as austerity went on for 10–15 years, the frontline was hit.

We introduced fortnightly bin collections. It was a difficult time, fronting up national government cuts to local authorities. I tried to explain to residents why the youth club I went to as a kid was no longer there – because the funding had dried up. Why grass that used to be cut fortnightly was now cut monthly. Why weekly bin collections became fortnightly. And why street bins were emptied monthly. Trying to explain these decisions, in the context of national cuts, was a real wake-up call. It was really difficult.

But as long as you can sit down and have open, honest conversations with residents – explain the context, explain your principles as a councillor – you can often take the community with you. Not everyone will agree, but it’s important for councillors, and especially leaders, to front the decisions you’re making, explain them, and try to bring residents along by co-producing as much as possible.

That’s my approach, both as a councillor and now as leader: to co-produce as much as possible in what we do as a council here at City Hall with residents in their communities.

But there’s also another story in Sunderland, which has had a huge amount of national attention, which is about really successful regeneration from city center redevelopment, investment in housing, and digital infrastructure. How did you balance those two realities? And what do you think are the ingredients for making that regeneration inclusive?

Fundamentally, we have to listen to and involve residents in what we’re doing. We set out on the Riverside Sunderland regeneration programme a number of years ago because we realised that our city centre, like others similar to us, was no longer the economic driver it once was.

COVID accelerated those challenges by five or six years due to the shift to online shopping. So we made a decision that we had to change the look, feel, and makeup of the city centre. We set about doubling the number of people who live in the city centre and doubling those who work there, through a programme in partnership with the private sector.

We took a punt by funding the first Riverside building, the Beam, ourselves. Then we partnered with L&G, who came in with significant investment, the biggest investment in Sunderland and its city centre at that time. We’ve just opened Keel Crossing, a £31m bridge connecting both sides of the river and expanding the city centre’s footprint.

We’re trying to tell a clear story about what we’re doing and why we’re doing it. Ultimately, we recognised the city centre as a weakness. When big retail chains like Debenhams closed nationally, it had an impact here locally.

These are long-term ambitions. We’ve been working on Riverside for nearly 10 years in planning, and it’s now beginning to bear fruit. We’re listening to the city. We want to create jobs, opportunities, and skills. We’ve partnered with Sunderland College to create the Housing, Innovation, Construction and Skills Academy, one of the government’s 10 new technical excellence colleges. We’ve got jobs, skills, housing. It’s fundamentally about reimagining what Sunderland City Centre is now and what it will be in 5, 10, 15 years’ time.

That, in turn, can drive economic revival: more jobs, better shops, more footfall, a stronger economy. It’s a multifaceted jigsaw, but we’ve been clear about our ambitions and how we’re trying to achieve them.

What I find fascinating is that the thread running through all of this is storytelling – conversations, dialogue with the community about ambitions for the place, our aspirations, our needs, and the trade-offs required to get there.

It’s not just my approach; it’s been the approach of the Labour Group for many years. Our guiding light is that we are custodians of Sunderland. We don’t have a birthright to lead the city – we are custodians. Ultimately, the people of Sunderland are the boss. Everything we do is guided by their input and feedback.

We try as much as possible to speak to, listen to, and engage with residents, and put their feedback at the bedrock of everything we do moving forward.

Tell me about neighbourhood working specifically. I know you have area plans looking to strengthen place-making and partnership working. Can you tell us about that strategy?

Our area committees in Sunderland are what I call the crown jewel. It’s one area we’ve strived to protect through all the austerity cuts. We have five area committees across the city, each based on neighbourhood areas, and made up of five electoral wards. Every elected member for those wards sits on the committee, regardless of party.

One fundamental reason they’ve been successful is that we consciously leave politics at the door. We all have the same budgets, and we come into the committees as representatives of our residents, not of our parties.

Institutions also sit on the boards. Gentoo, our biggest social housing provider, is there. Representatives from the voluntary and community sector feed in through the area VCS networks. The police and fire service attend regularly. Together, we co-produce neighbourhood plans underpinned by £500,000 of neighbourhood funding per area.

The council has its city plan and corporate plan, but the area committees succeed because they are bottom-up. They’re fed by residents’ priorities, VCS priorities, and councillors’ day-to-day community work. Everything feeds into an overarching area plan designed to make small but impactful decisions that genuinely improve people’s lives.

We devolved a quarter of the highway maintenance budget to area committees, so councillors can directly influence which streets or footpaths are added to the programme. It’s about devolving power to the local area and empowering local councillors to be leaders of their place.

One earlier example was when we were going through the large austerity cuts. We changed how local environmental services operated by appointing area response managers. We then sat down over six months with councillors to design cleaning schedules based on local knowledge: higher footfall areas being cleaned more frequently, quieter areas less so. Instead of a rigid citywide schedule, we created a responsive, locally-informed mosaic of cleansing. It allowed us to maintain standards despite reduced budgets.

That’s so interesting because you talked arlier about co-production and it’s a really good example of that. I think that’s really important that it’s not just a nice to have thing, it’s actually part of how you do business effectively.

Yes, absolutely. As I said previously, to me, area committees ensure the voice of residents is heard and has a direct impact on services. We moved away from the idea of a “backbench councillor” because in Sunderland, all councillors are frontline councillors. We work on the frontline with communities, co-producing, advocating for change.

We want councillors across all parties working directly with officers, cabinet members, and leadership to co-produce policies that benefit local residents. That ethos is a golden thread running through everything we do.

I know you recently received around half a million pounds from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to help people connect with nature and wellbeing. How does that fit into this picture?

We’re always delighted to receive any funding. With the Nature Towns and Fund, we were one of only 19 areas selected. It’s a small pot, but welcome, and it will have an impact. But the key is co-production. We’re going to sit down with residents to decide how we spend it.

Sunderland has some wonderful natural assets – a beautiful coastline, a river running through the heart of the city, fantastic country parks and open spaces. Through my cabinet member for environment, transport, and net zero, we’ll sit down over the coming weeks with all interested parties to co-produce how we use the funding. It’s not Sunderland City Council dictating; it’s a collegiate conversation about how to get the best outcomes and connect residents with our natural assets.

You’ve talked powerfully about your approach and about neighbourhood working. How do you measure success? Outcomes, relationships, community confidence? How do you assess what’s working and where improvements are needed?

It is multifaceted, but to me it’s always about impact. Are the people of Sunderland happier? Healthier? Do they live longer? Those are long-term ambitions, but the feeling of a place is crucial.

Not everything we’ve done in the last 15 years has been a roaring success. Some things have failed. But it’s about recognising when something isn’t working, getting around the table, understanding why, and changing course.

The impact of regeneration and neighbourhood work can be measured through our annual resident survey. We’re still below some LGA averages, but in the last two or three years we’ve seen significant jumps in satisfaction from what was, frankly, a very low baseline. It shows that impactful, co-produced decisions can be measured in both the short and long term.

You talked earlier about regeneration and your 5-, 10-, and 15-year vision. What do you want Sunderland to be like in 10, 15, or 20 years? What does that feel and look like?

Our city plan is for Sunderland to be an internationally connected city with opportunity for all by 2035. My chief executive will be pleased I remembered that.

For me, it’s about ensuring that a young person born in Sunderland today can, when they reach adulthood, pursue a career here that enables them to meet their life and professional goals. I hope my generation is the last that felt they had to leave Sunderland or the North East to excel.

We’ve now got the building blocks in place. HICSA – the Housing Innovation Construction Skills Academy – is pioneering construction skills learning. We work closely with Nissan. We’ve developed Made in the North East, a skills programme around advanced manufacturing. We’re pioneering Crownworks Studios, which will transform the film and TV industry here and create around 8,000 jobs.

Fundamentally, it’s about ensuring that a child born in Sunderland today can grow up to live in a decent home, in a thriving community, work in a fulfilling career, and have access to good schools and opportunities for their family. If in 20–25 years we can say we’ve achieved that, I’d consider it a job well done.

At LGIU were also interested in how local and combined authorities work together to make the whole more than the sum of the parts. I know that in the North East is a really good combined authority, really well run, with some really interesting work going on. How do you see that relationship evolving? And what does success look like in that for you?

For Sunderland to succeed, the North East Combined Authority must succeed. I’ve always been a strong advocate of devolution because better decisions are made by people with skin in the game. Devolving power from Westminster to the regions gives us the opportunity to drive innovation, investment, and transformation.

Transport is key because it transforms opportunity and life chances. People don’t care when they’ve crossed from Sunderland into County Durham or South Tyneside – they just want to get to work. Regional leaders must get this right.

This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity. We now have the money, resources, and powers in the region. It’s not “can we have?” – it’s “can we do?” NECA is set up, working well, and we’ve allocated significant funding to brilliant projects. Now we must move into delivery mode and embed these changes.

We have a brilliant mayor in Kim McGuinness, working well with council leaders. We’re excited about the coming single settlement, which will give us more power to design and deliver policies that impact the whole region, from Berwick to Barnard Castle. It’s a transformative moment.

To conclude, what would be your advice to someone entering local government now?

Go for it. It is a hugely rewarding career. Even when you first start out, you can shape your local area and your city. It can be difficult and comes with challenges, particularly online, but in my experience, the good outweighs the bad.

It’s a huge honour to be selected by the 8,000–9,000 residents in your ward to be their voice in City Hall. I would say: do it. If it’s not you, who else will it be?