The rural economy is being held back by a lack of affordable housing, supermarket price-wars, poor public transport and broadband connections, according to a new report.

The cross-party group of MPs and peers found the rural economy was 18% less productive than the national average. If this gap was reduced it could add £43bn to the UK economy.

The government said it welcomed the report, and that it was providing £2.6bn to rural areas.

The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on the Rural Powerhouse heard evidence from over 50 rural organisations including charities, campaign groups, academics, and business leaders. 

Calling it “one of the most comprehensive inquiries into the productivity of the rural economy” the co-chairman of the APPG, Lord Cameron of Dillington, said, “It is vital that government understands that rural Britain is not a museum, but instead is an important part of the national economy that deserves the chance to succeed.”

Britain’s nuclear power stations recorded a 12% decline in their contributions to the country’s energy system over the past month, as outages raised concerns over how long the ageing plants will be able to keep operating.

A temporary closure of two of the country’s eight nuclear plants resulted in a double-digit drop in nuclear generation in January, compared to the same period last year.

Prospects for new nuclear projects have commanded headlines and government attention in recent weeks, with Hitachi and Toshiba scrapping their plans for major new plants.

But the fate of the existing plants, which usually provide about a fifth of the UK’s electricity supplies, has been pulled into focus by outages due to safety checks and engineering works running over schedule. Nuclear outages also push up carbon emissions because any capacity shortfall will typically be replaced by fossil fuel power stations.

Britain’s north-south divide should be tackled by a government pledge in its new industrial strategy to provide every citizen with decent transport, schools, hospitals and digital access, an expert body says.

The independent industrial strategy commission on Wednesday urged ministers to tackle Britain’s regional imbalances by committing to universal basic infrastructure – a guaranteed standard for the whole of the UK.

Theresa May put an industrial strategy high on the agenda of the administration she formed following last year’s Brexit vote, and put a green paper out for consultation in January. A white paper is expected from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy before the end of the year.

The commission was set up following the publication of the green paper and in its final report said that while an industrial strategy could not do everything everywhere it should seek “to do something for everywhere”.

Dame Kate Barker, the chair of the commission, said: “The UK’s people, places and industries have great strengths and untapped potential, but we must accept the reality that the economy also contains many long-established weaknesses.

“Industrial strategy needs to be embraced as a long-term plan to manage the economy strategically and embedded throughout government. If we get the new strategy right it can build on these strengths, tackle our weaknesses and above all have a positive, long-lasting impact on people’s everyday lives. This implies that sometimes it will be right to choose equity and long-term-gains over short-term efficiency.”

A joint initiative between academics at Manchester and Sheffield universities, the commission said the new strategy should be driven by the long-term needs of the UK – to decarbonise the economy, to improve infrastructure and to boost export capacity, to unlock long-term investment and to ensure a sustainable health and social care system

In his autumn statement, he extended his support for the region with about £235m to create new materials science institutes across the four cities.

Manchester will also be helped to create a £78m new performance space, to be called The Factory in homage to the 1980s club, and Osborne confirmed plans to tender new franchises for Northern Rail and the TransPennine Express, which is forecast to increase capacity by at least 20%. The announcements come on top of the chancellor’s previous promises of new roads in northern England, a regional shale gas sovereign wealth fund and an HS3 high-speed rail track between Manchester and Leeds.

The moves are seen as an effort to make sure the recovery is not just concentrated in south-east England, but are also part of a political calculation by Osborne that the Conservatives desperately need to hold on to voters in the north, where there are some key marginal constituencies.

Many of the benefits of Osborne’s northern plan will go to the Labour-voting cities. However, there are also advantages for counties with Tory-voting pockets such as Lancashire and Cheshire. In the Conservative constituency of Weaver Vale in Lancashire, where Tory MP Graham Evans holds a majority against Labour of just 991, £113m has been allocated to a big data research centre at Hartree.