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Underprivileged parts of the country should be given a special status with additional funding to promote economic regeneration, a Labour MP has said.
Steve Rotheram (Liverpool Walton) said that independent organisations should be set up to tackle poverty in particular parts of the country where it is prevalent.
He told MPs that while certain areas of Liverpool had overcome significant regeneration under the previous Labour administration, the northern party of the city still faced desperate poverty.
Presenting a Bill under the ten-minute rule motion in the Commons, Rotheram said that there was desperate poverty in parts of Liverpool, but the problems were not "insurmountable".
He added that it would be "morally reprehensible" if parts of the UK were allowed to "fester and rot".
Proposing his Special Urban Development Zones Bill, Rotheram said: "It's all very well to bang on about austerity measures but as I have pointed out repeatedly in this place, any economy which grows while concentrations of deprivation up and down the country are simply left to fester and rot is an utterly false, foolish, and precarious economy. It's also morally reprehensible."
He said: "Liverpool's socio-economic problems are common knowledge but what many outsiders won't know is that in north Liverpool they disproportionately concentrated and the consequences correspondingly magnified.
"A complex and historic mix of issues such as low educational attainment, a low skills base, high welfare dependency, poor housing, low skilled and often casual employment and poverty of aspiration.
"This has made for a potent, self-perpetuating, cyclical cocktail of disadvantaged and marginalisation."
Highlighting North Liverpool, he said the area needed a "fresh, full spectrum approach" in tackling the root causes of poverty.
Rotheram called for financial incentives, including tax breaks, for businesses in the areas in designated zones as part of a "clear and holistic strategy" to deal with deprivation.
The Bill will be read a second time on Friday June 17 but stands little chance of becoming law without government support.
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