This week is set for a strange political spectacle – Michael Gove coming to the rescue of Boris Johnson with a "levelling up" White Paper that will turn heads, draw gasps of appreciation from grateful Red Wall voters and deflect all attention from the ongoing car crash that is Partygate Postponed.

Can it work? The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing, Communities and Intergovernmental Relations is an unlikely modern version of General Custer, who arrived at the Battle of Gettysburg in the nick of time, saving the day for the union in 1863.

Govey is more than twice the Boy General's age on that famous day and better known for disloyalty to his Commander in chief than any tricksy skills with the cavalry.

Apparently, Johnson "wanted to punch" Gove in 2016 after his erstwhile friend bid to become prime minister on the morning of a speech in which Boris was set to announce his own candidacy, a move that deftly destroyed both men’s chances, leaving the way open for Theresa May to clinch the poisoned chalice.

Gove later insisted he had no choice but to sink Johnson’s campaign, insisting “It’s not treachery. I explained my reasons at the time. The water is under the bridge.” And there it seems to have stayed.

Still, it’s surprising to think that the man who tried to torpedo Johnson’s Prime Ministerial ambitions six short years ago, is now charged with saving them. Some might think it’s a measure of desperation at Tory HQ. But Gove will doubtless stick to the line that he’s been beavering away for months – years even – to produce this seminal policy that will somehow cement the deal between an ignored, patronised and under-developed north and the Tory Party wot won it for the south.

According to a government statement ahead of this week’s levelling up white paper, 20 towns and cities will benefit from a £1.5bn pot, funding developments that will combine "housing, leisure and business in sustainable, walkable beautiful new neighbourhoods". Not a patch on the sums missing through government mishandling of Covid loans fraud, but still. Head-turning.

Until you read that the money is composed of levelling-up funds first announced by chancellor, Rishi Sunak, in his spending review last autumn. So not new money at all.

According to Labour’s Lisa Nandy it is just a "bit of a refund in a few places on the vast sums of money" lost to the North by years of Tory rule.

And indeed, while it’s tempting to dwell on the shambolic nature of this weekend’s announcement, it would behove a political party worthy of the name Opposition to use the momentum of this moment and blast ‘levelling up’ out of the political water altogether.

Since when did the British public and chattering class accept this ludicrous euphemism for equality?

A bit like staycationing that's really just a holiday and wild swimming that's really just ... swimming, levelling up is really just equality. Regional equality. So why can’t a party that believes in planning, management and good governance call it that again?

A bit too scarily socialist – a bit too Jeremy Corbyn? Worse – a bit too donkey jacket and Michael Foot perhaps?

Back in the 70s, levelling up was just regional planning and industrial policy, both regarded as essential levers for any intelligent government to avoid creating an overheated honeypot around its capital city with the consequent destruction of regional jobs and solidarity-eroding disparity in wealth, income and costs across the country.

Is it just a curse of age to remember these policies as entirely unremarkable?

Now the public is expected to swoon with gratitude when a lump of (one-off) money comes their way – derived from taxes they send to Westminster in the first place?

Has the American Dream of making it big despite (not because of) government so completely overtaken the once socialist outlook of the Red Wall seats that voters are ready to see their local leaders stand cap in hand, waiting for a handout?

Does anyone else recall a time before the National Lottery when folk expected progress to come from a well-run system, not the tiny chance of a personal windfall obtained from an ill-gotten kitty of (disproportionately) working class cash? In short, have voters so completely forgotten the days when the economy wasn't run as a massive free-for-all that they'll accept Gove's levelled-up baubles?

My guess is that all-important Red Wall seats won't be so easily palmed off.

Even if collective recall of the 70s is hazy, memory of recent Tory betrayals is pretty good.

Like the axed commitment to build the second phase of HS2 to Leeds and Manchester, even as the main vanity line from London to Birmingham goes ahead.

Like the slashed plans for Northern Powerhouse Rail which leave Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford and Hull with a fragmented service of old, slow, polluting diesel trains?

Like the housing threshold in the proposed social care reforms which means more northerners will wind up selling their homes.

Like the national insurance rise which taxes work not wealth and thus impacts the working poor more than comfortable pensioners.

Like the levelling up payments already made that are skewed towards relatively wealthy Tory towns not the poorest Labour-voting areas.

Like the Tory intention to switch back from PR to first past the post for mayoral elections, in a bid to thwart the election of troublesome Labour mayors.

And then combine all of these open betrayals with the slap in the face to morality and decency that is Partygate.

The British Government’s Levelling Down strategy of 2021 will take some reversing – and it’ll take more than Gove’s last stand to stop Boris Johnson feeling the wrath of northern voters in May’s local elections.