Nearly nine out of ten people on Merseyside asked about the Government's view of their area think it is treated worse than the rest of the country by the Conservatives.
The vast majority of those who responded to a new survey by The Northern Agenda politics newsletter believe Liverpool and the surrounding area are unfavourably treated because of its strong history of Labour support and difficult history with Conservative governments.
And across the North, more than two-thirds of those asked about Boris Johnson's Levelling Up ambitions believe the Prime Minister's flagship domestic policy will never lead to improvements in their area.
The survey of more than 1,000 people across the region reveals massive scepticism about the Government's efforts to tackle regional inequalities and bridge the North-South divide.
Asked when they expect the Government's 'Levelling Up' plans to lead to improvements in their area, 69% of respondents said 'never'. Some 18% said the improvements would happen within a decade, 10% before the next General Election and 3% within a year.
Mr Johnson will be pinning his hopes of getting back into power at the next General Election on Northern voters in former Labour strongholds the Conservatives won in the 2019 General Election.
But Merseyside bucked the national trend in 2019, with Labour retaining all of its 14 seats.
Despite the Conservatives gaining in many Labour heartlands, seats including Birkenhead, Bootle, Knowsley, and Sefton Central remained red, while Labour retained all five Liverpool seats with thumping majorities.
Damien Moore remains the only Tory MP on Merseyside after being re-elected in Southport with an increased majority.
Of the 135 people from Liverpool and Merseyside who filled in The Northern Agenda's survey, 87% said they believe the areas are treated worse than other areas by Conservative governments because of the strong Labour vote.
When asked if Labour councils in Merseyside should engage with the Conservative government, 80% of respondents said yes and 20% said no.
And asked what areas of investment Liverpool and Merseyside need most, the most popular answer was raising living standards at 36%.
Some 28% of respondents said proper council funding, 18% said infrastructure projects, 12% said social care funding and 6% said better transport funding.
Last week, Liverpool City Region mayor Steve Rotheram told The Northern Agenda podcast that if his region had not worked with government during the pandemic, "people would have died".
Asked about the perception by some in the region that Labour leaders should not engage with the Conservative government, he said: "You have to sometimes work with them."
He added: "It's a frustration because some departments are awful. And I think they've been awful, whether they've been Labour or Tory, if I'm absolutely honest, or coalition, like the Department for Education.
"You just can't get them to do the things even though you can explain the business case for them and win the arguments, they just want to centralise and we need them to devolve instead of taking power back into the centre. But we have to try and persuade them.
"And that's why it's a regular thing where we meet with Secretaries of State and try to explain the case that we're putting forward, because it's an investment opportunity for national governments. And they can get a return on that investment, if they were with us."
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