Voters in ‘Red Wall’ areas a third more likely to be murdered as Boris Johnson falls short on vow to level up Britain

BORIS Johnson is falling woefully short on his Red Wall vow to level up Britain, a damning report reveals today.

Voters in the seats which swept him to victory in 2019 still lag far behind.

They remain significantly less well off than the rest of the UK and are more likely to have diabetes and be disabled or obese.

Alcohol misuse in Red Wall areas is higher and life expectancy more than a year lower.

And people living there were almost a third more likely to be murdered last year.

Tonight, the PM’s own Tory MPs in the North and Midlands called for action.

Hartlepool’s Jill Mortimer said: “My constituents don’t want handouts — they want targeted solutions.”

Stoke-on-Trent North’s Jonathan Gullis said: “Levelling up must be about skills and jobs.”

The study by the Legatum Institute think-tank compiled a UK Prosperity Index 2021 which listed all 379 local authorities.

Hartlepool came 358th and Stoke 359th. Bottom was Blackpool and top Wokingham, Berks.

The study found that the number of adults with no qualifications in the 43 Red Wall seats that went from Labour to Tory in the 2019 election was a third higher than elsewhere.

Private investment companies ploughed £83.20 a head into those areas, against a £145.60 UK average. And business start-ups were almost a fifth lower.

Baroness Philippa Stroud, CEO of the Legatum Institute, said of Red Wall levelling-up: “The lack of access to business loans and adult qualifications are clearly some of the key places to start.”