The Politics of Place
In particular, at some of those places loosely characterized, sometimes inaccurately, as the red wall, but broadly, the places that haven't necessarily gained from the economic growth of the dynamism of some of our city centers in some parts of England to try and understand the people who live there.What has happened to them politically, and how things might change in the future?So if we could stop.The screen share now please.Thank you very much.We've got 3 great speakers to introduce this topic today.To put to our speakers, please you that use the Q&A function question answer function. That's the one I'll be monitoring if you go onto that, you can see questions that other people have put.So if you would like to upvote questions that you think are particularly important, that's really helpful to me in the chair.Yeah, but get us underway.Come over to John to mini to introduce the politics of place.Thank you, John.You're muted, John.Thanks John, I'm just going to try and share my screen here.Can you all see that?Right?OK so thanks John for the the introduction and for the invitation I'm.I'm going to.Talk about labor and the politics of place today.Partly because I've been working on this very topic.For a.Uh, a sort of broader piece of work which is being put together by labor together, or we published later this month, and, uh, a group of us have been kicking around this topic, holding seminars, interviewing key actors.If you like in this debate over the last few months, and these are my collaborators here, so so it's sort of like.Knowledge that I'm drawing on work contributed to part by others.So we have started off with some I, I suppose, axioms that have guided.The way we're thinking.About the the relationship between labor and the politics of place.Uhm, we're working on the assumption that place is increasingly central to politics today, but it's certainly as far as the the Liberal Party is being concerned.Is is being neglected in in in labor strategies in all kinds of ways?There's probably a seminar in that, so I'll move on and say that from the point of view of Labor and.Issues that John raised in the introduction, I think.We conclude that engaging with place is crucial, that both renewing labours are paying it in its traditional heartlands, and also to provide lasting solutions to geographical inequalities, and what we recognize is that geograph geographical inequalities in the UK in England.Are are are very large.In international terms among rich countries.And increasingly, I think we you can make a case that it's place not party which which is shaping politics in England.This was.A a point made by Andy Burnham in one of the seminars that we organized that in his view, he's representative increasingly of a place which he calls Greater Manchester.Rather than a party.This is an interesting thing about these things.We also know that people in left behind places, as John said, it's a really complex and problematic term, but nevertheless we all know what we mean when we use that term are more.Likely to feel.Disenfranchised, ignored and skeptical about politics and in our seminars, we looked at the very strong evidence on.All of this.These are often places which.Had previously strong communal bonds of one kind or another, and and again, there's quite strong evidence that these are that fraying in many places.Labour philosophically as well. It's had a very unhappy relationship with Plymouth and the whole question of devolution in England since 1945.The mindset of LABOURISM after 1945. It was very much a top down centralist approach when it came to governing and which is in many ways.At odds with the with the history of Labor before 1945, again, I think there's another seminar to be so to be organized and all of that.And and of course, what all of this means is that recently the Conservatives have owned the place Agenda post 2010 Osborne George Osborne promoted what we might call a big city localism, which accelerated the transformation of the city centers that John mentioned earlier on and then post 2016, of course.There's being this renewed focus on left behind towns.Boris Johnson first speech specifically mentioned them.At this phrase level.Going up and and all we've wrapped up in the in the broader agenda of taking back control.These things are seen as of a piece, I guess in the in the in Johnson ISM, if that's what we want to call it.So leveling up.Is being the political buzzword of the time and you know it may not last much longer given that it's associated very much with somebody whose star is on the way.And let's put it like that.But there is the question of what is leveling up and will it make a difference?There's no question that it responds.To real political.Issues which I've just sort of outlined very briefly.But what is it?And really, what it is?Is a potpourri of policies rather.Than strategy, you know.Including things as diverse as freeports and hanging baskets, leadership UN increased R&D outside of the Golden Triangle. Lots of things going on.Yeah, and and it's by no means clear that these things are going to work.So for instance, take freeports, which is really a central element of the leveling up agenda, and there was a there was a really brutal assessment of the likely impact.Of Freeport and the most recent or be our report on government finances, which basically sort of indicated you know well, it's basically warning us not to have any high hopes around the impacts of freeports in in tackling these geographical inequalities.There's a whole issue which is emerged in relation for leveling up from the ground pork barreling a very good work, showing how this has worked in relation to the towns fund.So what's new in all of this? Free ports are arguably just a reheating of enterprise zones. What's new about in relation to R&D strategies? These these things are.I think very pertinent questions they may be answered in the White Paper, which we're told now will appear later this year, but we don't know what that's going to contain, and it might get lost in the noise.And I suppose the larger question is whether what whatever appears and what we've got so far, is sufficient to offset the larger forces that are marginalizing some communities in, in, in England.So for instance, we can talk about freeports, but if you pick up the local newspaper in Newcastle today.Nexus the public transport operator which runs the Metro service is talking about its finances collapsing in in in the coming weeks.So you can have all the R&D you want, but if the trains aren't running, you've got a.Big problem there.There's also a question about where local government reform fits into all into this agenda.The government floated some ideas around this in the Sunday papers a few weeks before Christmas, and.They went down like.The proverbial lead balloon, so there's a lot of.A lot of reasons to be skeptical about this agenda, but and also to be skeptic.About the white paper. If you think back to 2020 in the planning White Paper, which was going to transform the the planning system in England, it's it's largely died in the time since.So we noticed that there are certain important facts that we need to be aware of local government expenditure.Massive cuts since 2010.Promises of increases, but nowhere near repairing what's happened, I mean.Judith will be able to tell you a lot.More about all of.This we have an incredible pattern of churn in regional governance in England.I'm not going to go through all the detail of this particular figure.But what it's there to do, and this is work from the Institute for Government is is to show that we are constantly making and breaking structures of local and regional governance in England in ways which are entirely counterproductive.And what we have a pattern of local government in this case of the West Midlands and which is fragmented, incoherent and entirely opaque to the citizen.Very important public services delivered in ways in which the citizen finds extraordinary.Difficult to grasp, understand and influence.And so we have these long standing problems, but we've but we must acknowledge that in England we have what we might call structural obstacles to devolution.And and these can be summarized, I think in in the.Following way first of.All and we could again talk a lot.More about this.Good central governments of all types over a long period of have insufficiently trusted subnational government to devolve.Powers to it.There are many examples around the country of incumbent local politicians opposing local reform for all sorts of reasons.Where proposals have been put.Forward to improve.Regional governance and there's been it's been difficult to get agreement around these and particularly about the best spatial scale for local or regional governance.Citizens are unsure about the value of regional governance.And this is probably even more so after austerity the case.And finally, you know, going back to.That figure I.Showed just a moment ago, institutional churn is.Now part of the problem.The creation and destruction of of an institutions is now the English way of doing these things, and it's probably.Not very productive.And in dealing with these problems, the left deals with a set of dilemmas it struggles with with the notion of localism.If you like.It struggles about its struggles.Include the balance between equity and devolution.Uhm, do we devolve powers in ways which mean the provision of public services is unequal between places?Is that a good thing?Is that?Socialist or whatever.Uhm, we struggle.Uh, in terms of the relationship between participating in representative democracy.Uhm, we struggle in terms of whether we empower people or place, and there's a that that brings the whole Andy Burnham point in about party versus versus place issue.All of these issues were unresolved under New Labour.Often not necessarily very carefully thought through on the new liver and also under Corbynism.Uhm, there's a there's an additional problem that some local, some some labor councils have a very poor represented a reputation.So in Deborah, Mattinson spoke on the red wall.She talks about how.Now you know in left behind places, red wall places.Many people have more complaints about the local Labor Council than they did about Tory austerity.And all of this partially.Explains Labour struggle to respond to the leveling up agenda I think.And So what this suggests is that the first step really here is is is a need for labor to understand and accept, accept the scale of the economic, political and constitutional challenge it faces if it's going to speak to its former heartlands and also address their underlying social economic challenges.So in the paper that I talked about, which will appear shortly, we sketch out three issues, 33 areas where we think which are potentially very promising.And in thinking about what an agenda might look like for labor in relation to place, the first destroying on ideas about the foundational economy.And this is a set of ideas which I think are very promising.A new way of thinking about the economy, which is very relevant to the PL agenda.The foundational economy.The first is that part of the economy that creates and distributes goods and services consumed by all, regardless of income, because they support everyday life now traditional.Traditionally regional policy in England is focused on.Improving the performance of the tradeable economy and and the foundational economy.Which which is crucial for independent global living standards is often being neglected, and this is an area where.Interventions are possible which would have impacts in the places that most need them, and in a sense overcome this equity versus devolution dilemma.A huge area in discussing all this and I'm gonna pass over it because I think I've only got a couple more points left that I can make in the time available.But Rachel Reeves.Interestingly, is onto this agenda.She would've pamphlet little lie back about the everyday economy, which is an attempt to engage with this.This kind of thinking.So you know for many left behind places, improving research and development.Uh might be good for the broader economy, but does it impact on their local lives in the way that, for instance, improving the provision?Of buses does.A second concept that is being widely discussed at the moment or more widely discussed, which I think is relevant to this agenda, concerns the notion of of physical have social infrastructure, the physical places and organisations that shape the way people interact.Very influential book.The states on this by Klinenberg who's at NYU? We've looked at these spaces within which differences are managed. Local attachments are formed and cohesive communities of thought.And I think there's quite a lot of very persuasive evidence that declining and look at social infrastructure in so-called left behind places underpins the sorts of feelings of loss and lack of control which the the Tories have successfully observed but haven't quite found a way to tap into politically.Ah, yet I think beyond the tick back.Or, uh, rhetoric and we are doing some work at UCL in a village in County Durham, which I which I think really supports this idea of the importance of of social infrastructure.So, and another nice piece of work in recently out of LSC.Looking at the law of pub closures in fermenting political disenchantment.In England.So finally then, just to conclude in my last minute, UM.It's crucial to all of this is devolution and the broader devolution of power and within it the Lord strong and effective local government.So we sketch out.Some of the issues around all of this and.And in particular, think about, you know, thinking if you had an incoming Labour government committed to an agenda to improve place, what would this look like?Well, there, there'd be a strong case for the rapid reinforcement of existing devolved bodies.Uhm, that there are.Structured devolved structures in England now, which are gaining legitimacy even if they remain rather.And combined authorities, particularly now combined authorities being one important example of that.But we know that we need to have institutions that the larger than the local scale in order to manage all kinds of infrastructure and public service provision issues.Increasingly, we think that these should be built out of what exists already rather than created.New that involves working within the existing patchwork of governance to enhance capacity and resources where the appetite for this exists, 'cause it doesn't always exist and it's hard worked to achieve this objective.If there isn't that appetite, there are lessons to be learned from labor successes, particularly the successes of some of the metro.Alerts in this respect again, we could all pack all of that, but what was interesting about last year's local elections was how very quickly a narrative of Labor defeat.Became the story of those elections when in reality there were some interesting successes in all of that, but deserve attention.Primarily, of course, what what, what strong and effective local government requires or stable constitutional and and fiscal frameworks.Again, that's a bullet point that opens up a huge area of discussion, but one element that must be diversifying the tax base of of local government.And there's ways in which this can be done.And and then finally, given what I said earlier about the problematic performance of particular level of government in some places, and there's a very powerful argument to be made for devolving power beyond local government to community organisations, so new local, for instance, has talked about enabling.Councils is that is the way.Forward and are working.In villages in County Durham, certainly I, I say I I would argue points to this.Some of the great dynamism in in the most left behind places is not found in local government, but is found in the community.Organisations which operate.In some cases it has to be said despite local government, but because of it.And within all of this, we need space for emerging regional identities within England, and that would include a kind of accommodation or a space for the expression of what you might call the northern grievance and which Burnham and the other metro mayors in the North have been very successful.I think it articulate.I think so.That's my 15 minutes of fame and I'll stop there and I'll hand back all the way to June.John, thank you very much indeed, and that's a hugely, uh, interesting and challenging agenda that you've set out.There, but it can follow the shape of it very very clearly.Can I just remind people on the on the web and R?Please do put questions into the Q&A, uh, that I can have for the panelists later on. But I gotta move on now.To Judith Blake.Who was, I think fair, say at the sharp end, both of some of those financial changes you were talking about, but also the the challenges of dealing with central government on devolution.So Judith would be very interesting to have your response to what John had to say.Thank you John and can I say an enormous thank you to John for laying out the the case and the arguments so clearly and I find it really thought provoking and my personal situation is I stepped down as leader of Leeds City Council in just at the end of February last year.So less than a year ago.And knowing that I was going to step down from the Council in May and taking up my seat in the House of Lords, and I've I'm.I'm now on the front bench in the House of Lords and I've just moved across from the Department of leveling up to have a more central role in bays or business.We call it now as energy has moved out.Come under Ed Miliband.So a really interesting position in terms of how we actually come up with some solutions to the issues that that John raised so eloquently.And and I think it's worth just repeating for, you know, so it's at the forefront of our mind just how far behind we are in England.Especially in terms of devolution, and I talked to colleagues a lot down here in terms of the the model of devolution in Scotland and Wales and and and certainly from a local government perspective and labour in way.Sales in particular and what's happened in Scotland?I think there's a real sense that there's been devolution in Scotland in particular to come to the assembly, but it hasn't gone down much further, so local government in Scotland is is really struggling.Come from from that that that that whole agenda, and yet there is a perception that devolution.Is is working through there, which I think we need to look and learn and actually be very mindful of what's happened.So what we know is internationally that the UK is very really near the top on a wide range of indicators of regional inequality, and it's probably one of the most unequal.Large industrial countries and how can we link that to the lack of progress in devolution and the fact that England is probably the most centralized country in certainly in the Industrial West.Like and and the interesting thing for me is.The work that's been done on tracking local engagements in areas of high centralization and the very poor electoral turnouts.For example, in those areas and I think that's something we need to be mindful of.'cause running through all of this.First of all, I absolutely agree that there we need to have.A really robust narrative for what we mean by devolution, what it's going to deliver, why people in our communities should engage with it and support it, and, uh.Take part in elections that hopefully will come from it on on a a wider level, but the frustration really that even though we have made progress and we have established directly elected mayors of a quite a significant amount of the North now, there's still some way to go.Talking to those, the metro mayors, they're real frustration in the lack of power that they have.And actually the COVID experience over the last two years almost now.And it was really local government that led the response to government.Because we have the vested powers around public health for example, and real ability to get directly out into the business community to administer the loans that came through.Et cetera et cetera, and I think.The The There's just a growing frustration at the level of metro mayors that they have enormous soft power.If you like and the the fact that the media go to them and they are the center of disk.But the the lack of direct fiscal powers, for example, remains an enormous challenge.My concern with the way that things are moving forward at all of the different funding regimes that that it really is quite obscene.How different local areas have to bid for.Money, it's it's competitive.It's not collaborative.It's almost a case of my deprivation is worse than yours and in more deserving.But in in the way that it's used politically as a tool of division, is is something we need to be very wary of.And as John said, the austerity agenda.Has been devastating for large parts of the country and this isn't just a north-south.Discussion and also within the North there are areas of high affluence as well as those areas that are really struggling and and we have to be aware of that ability too.Being manipulated, if you like to make sure that the progress that we need to make doesn't actually happen, and I would say from my own personal experience, it isn't just the politicians that we need to be aware of and their their agenda.It's also Whitehall itself, which I'm afraid and and this is from.Looking at it very close up and even more so now.Now is has so much aversion to real devolution that it's hard to see how we can make progress when we have such a narrow and short.Political timetable in terms of political advantage of getting into power and then when what you can do with it.And then I'm, you know, looking forward and anticipating the next election.So we know that the devolution White Paper got put to one side.We know Michael Gove has moved in to take over the dilukDepartment, as it's known affectionately down.Yeah, and and again the the leveling up for much anticipated White paper is being delayed. It was supposed to be out before Christmas is and now that I hear it's the twenty week beginning the 24th of January.But we have to wait and see what that comes.But just to give a bit of context and a bit.Of experience, from what it was.Like being the leader of Leeds City Council working within Yorkshire and the north, and I have to say that.You know, being involved in one of the large cities in the north.And the the George Osborne northern parish.Powerhouse project did give some give us a boost and it encouraged us as the five main cities to work together.We went to China.We went on investment trips together for example, and there was a real sense that we we could make a difference working together at that level.Published transport for the north as the first statutory transport body outside of London.And really we did feel that we were getting some traction and and I guess Manchester was the first to break away and and go for the Metro Mayor model which.Wasn't universally welcome across other areas.I have to say we'd all had referendums and a very strong local view that that wasn't the way that we went wanted to go.So there was resistance in other parts in terms of the model.Uh, uh, real irritation and annoyance that governments and vital seemed, although they kept saying the rhetoric was of course it's got to be locally determined and locally determined with local government and representing their local population.But in our case we come.We wanted to move forward with devolution for Leeds City region which is incorporates districts from outside of West Yorkshire.Three main mainly in North Yorkshire including and including York, so Harrogate, Selby and Craven.And we couldn't convince government that even though this was our functioning economic area and it just made sense for us to go together and to overcome those bureaucratic obstacles that the government had artificially in.Our view put in.And and we were told that we couldn't have Leeds City region, but we had to go away.Come up with our own bespoke models so we went away and we came up with the one Yorkshire model.And against all expectation and government trying to tell us that leaders in Yorkshire couldn't get on with each other, we got pretty well universal sign up.We set-up a Yorkshire Leaders Board with the Councils from across Yorkshire and we set-up the One Yorkshire Committee bringing together all of the partners and and both those are still in existence.But it became clear that the funding TAP was being turned off because we did, we didn't.We weren't progressing.With the West Yorkshire Merrell models, so we decided we had to be pragmatic.We couldn't get left behind in that.Way and we decided across the Yorkshire to follow.That South Yorkshire would go ahead and draw down the powers which it hadn't done, and West Yorkshire would establish a mayoral model, which it did, and I'm delighted to say, actually, that dumb we were successful in electing the first female Metro mayor, which is a whole other story that I think we need to be mindful of in terms of representation.And attraction and reach to the people we're hoping to take part in.Uhm so uhm.North Yorkshire is going through the process of actually reorganizing now so that they can move forward and their districts will be dissolved and become unitary.And that I understand there will be a directly elected mayor.So what we have is a situation where we could have had Yorkshire devolution.With all of that issue of pride, trust, recognition of brand.Incredible diversity in terms of people, but geography, economic, energy production, transport, all of those things, and we've had to to to go down to four separate models with all of the expense that that entails.So, uhm, I hope we we certainly.In in Yorkshire there is still the hope that one York, the Sensurround 1 Yorkshire, will come through event.Actually, but what we know is that we can't just be bought off with promises of infrastructure investment.This has to be we have to really go down to the grassroots, and I think this is the point that John was making.We have to address the issues.That are concerning people in our communities.So skills.Poverty health inequalities which have just been absolutely at the forefront.Through the whole COVID experience, we have to be able to move away to a sustainable funding footprint.A longer term agenda building on the work that the UK 70 Commission under John Bob Kerslake has put forward, but most.Of all we have to all work together to come up with a fair and transparent funding mechanism.Their funding mechanisms than the money that is very slow at coming forward.Is is done in such a an opaque way and it there really is huge cynicism about the motivation and their methodology?That's that's that's being used, and one of the disappointments about the leveling up like paper and something we need to look out for, is the rumors that there is no money.Attached to it.So how on Earth it's going to resolve the the real structural issues that are facing us?And so some steps forward I have to say on this agenda and and a lot of experience to draw on and actually.Uhm, you know, I really do believe local government has to be at the center of this.It's absolutely essential that there is that democratic mandate at a, uh, a local level and a lot actually of the polling has is suggesting that people do trust local politicians now more than national politicians.And I think that's something.We need to look at, but engagement will be linked to increased powers coming down to a local level and and we have a way to go on that.And there is an enormous determination around this agenda, a real recognition that it is the lack of progress is what's holding us back and and a real sense that if we could move forward on in in so many of the areas that John outlined, then we could really seriously start talking about transforming the life chances of people in our communities.Right across the country.Thank you.Yeah, thank you very much indeed and that that experience is is fascinating to to hear the way that you ended up with what you finally got in West Yorkshire and what what might have been just to say to people who want to take part in the chat.Quite a few notes are coming through just to host some panelists.You can Click to send your chat comments to everyone, so if you want to make sure you do that to open up the discussion, that would be great.And please do keep the questions coming in.We're already guessing quite a few.So Judith was talking at the end there about trusts and local politicians, which I think Britain brings us neatly to world Jennings and passing or more recent research will.Thanks John and I may say a word or two about trust as we go on and and and thanks to to Jonathan John for your paper in your presentation, which I'll I'll respond to.I think on one level you get very little argument for me, the place matters to politics and labor politics, specifically Jerry Stoker, who I see as in the attendees and I have been making this point for about 7-8 years and I think.Well and it was an observation that we had and and and opened up discussions about.Really back in 2014, even before.The Brexit vote.This was something that was increasingly important and obvious and was actually fracturing the coalitions of both electoral parties.I think often this is framed as a labor problem, but I think it's a much more general tendencies that shaping.British politics, and as you said, you know we're increasingly understanding British.Politics through the.Ends of place. It's certainly true that you know they're gonna. We talk about two England's Jerry Jeremy Cliff wrote about Clapton to Cambridge.We talk about the red wall, the blue wall, and Patrick English was riding this recently about the yellow belt.I think there's an increasing tendency to talk about place, and I will then you know, go against about eight years of argument from me and say it is important for us to remember.Widen individual level but also the macro level places an expression of.A wider range.Of trends you know nationally so you know the we, you know, Jerry and I are.In our work.Started this focus on electoral geographical polarization, which is we all now now now know is labor doing better in cities conservatives and towns.But that I.Think it's so important to remember that reflects the changing demographics of places.With towns getting older cities, getting younger, more diverse, more graduate.It's towns account stagnating I think would be a fair a fair choice of words to describe it.Actually I think we when we started out we we we started talking about shrinking places but there's reviewers and editors said well actually, you know places aren't shrinking, they're just not growing in to the same extent as the certain urban areas.But those changing demographics of places also reflect the fundamental economic model of the past 40 years and actually joining one thing was interesting in your your paper.I didn't really see the.Words agglomeration too much and I'm on level.I think that agglomeration model that we have shifted towards focused on the knowledge, economy and services in the wake of the decline of traditional industries is absolutely central to what we're seeing in those demographic shifts and our changing economic model.And it's why those former industrial talent.Towns have seen the sharpest decline.Why they're aging, but why?Also, there are huge pressures.I think getting and will be increasingly so on things like social care and why it's difficult to sustain public infrastructure and transport infrastructure in places that answers densely populated with as active economic populations.Why those places have seen Larry Niven?Investment and I.Think for me that that emphasis in our conversation is.Really important because it.Actually emphasizes not any easy tractable problem to solve.For government, I think leveling up has presented something.It's kind of, it's it's.It's an area where we can have simple solutions about places.And so in in.In political terms, I think the educational polarization we see, which is national.It is expressed through geography because we have a an even distribution of graduates in the country.We have age.Polarization is expressed through geography because we have a a distribution of demographic distribution that is unequal.And so I think.And I I'm trying.To push against this for the past few years, so I I think you're obviously not guilty of this.But places like the red wall are treated as sort of mystical places with special authentic qualities.And and although there might be some contextual effects or something different about living in a town from a major urban center, a lot of the trends and the factors we're seeing are about the composition of places about how those places have been drifting apart.In demographic.Terms I think 1.Of the really interesting things that I think was.A little bit.Behind in your paper, but I think.Is there is that that the factor about party electoral success is also increasingly structured by geography but actually party organization is?As well, I might say in a minute that one of your observations, Jerry and I made in a.I think there's an article for renewal of a few years ago, was suggesting that the labor you know one of the solutions might be a sort of an exchange program.From its activists.It's actually if you and I think we certainly saw.That in 20.17 election is if if a party is increasingly concentrated and its supporters.Increasingly concentrated in large urban centers, it's activists.This becomes actually increasingly unrepresentative of the wider country, and I think labour challenge actually is about getting.It's, you know, it's party members in England and Hackney to interact with it's party members in Wakefield and Barrow in Furness.Actually, I think.That's a really major challenge for Labour Party about cultural exchange.Uhm, the the the the, the labor movement, and one thing that I think is really interesting in this space is about we tend to connect these debates about regional productivity with devolution, but I think that's still contestable about whether one you know whether.Leveling up really needs to happen.The evolution component.I'm obviously someone who's sympathetic to arguments for decentralization, but I think it is interesting to consider a world in which some of the policy solutions remain centralized, not.But I really believe that's the case, but.I think sometimes it's easy to.Rush to devolutions the solution without getting back to the the fund the fundamentals.I'm just just.Shifting on a little bit, I mean I think.While the interesting things about leveling up is the shift of conservative focus from agglomeration and city regions to towns, which I think has to be seen partly as about political expediency as the unifying feature, I think the shift from George Osborne to Theresa May and then Boris Johnson has reflected in a fundamental rethinking of of kind of conservative strategy.But that that reflects a degree of political incoherence.That in some.Ways is about political adaptation.It's actually I think, you know, I think you you are.I think you and Andy Pike in our MSN political quarterly identified the political incoherence of leveling up.But I actually would say on one level that doesn't matter as much.You know on one obviously from policy terms, it matters fundamentally to us, but I think in political to.Terms it may not be as damaging as people think, and so that I saw in that the Q&A there was a question about, you know, is is leveling up spectacle and Jerry and I certainly have our argued that one of the features of leveling up is it's it's expectable.After that kind of potpourri of policy measures you talked about, you know actually of freeports and so forth is a is a feature.Not a bug.And so you know the very interesting, important work that Chris Hanretty done on pork barrel politics, for example.And for those of us in sort of policy circles, think this is outrageous way to allocate public funds.But voters think, well, that's quite good.I'm getting some pork for my local area.I think that's for the Labor Party.Really really deep challenge of responding to leveling up as a political strategy because.Thus, while at a structural level, we may think this is not a solution to addressing problems of geographical inequality and local voters think, well that's a very nice 25 pound £25 million investment in my local area that the government cares about my local area and they're recognizing there's a problem, and I think that's a really important political aspect.Of the debate, so I think this there is a dilemma for the left of how to respond to spectacle and pork barrel.Politics and this divergent in its parliamentary party and it's active activists.And I think in devolution the one thing we we know as as with previous David governments is that all governments are resistant to giving power away and so in opposition.It is very easy to develop an agenda based around the evolution, decentralization and so forth.It is less easy when entering offers to actually follow through on that.So I'm just gonna just to kind of focus on final couple of aspects.I think the there's a.There's a challenge of how we relate these relatively opaque policy debates, such as about the foundational economy to feelings of distrust, resentment, and loss of faith and labor representation.But more broadly, in those constituencies.And I think for for the left and for labour there is a challenge of what sort of narrative can give people back a feeling of empowerment.I I think certainly decentralization. Devolution is a potential Ave for this, but I think it's not that it it can be very easily as as New Labour found in the in the 2000.And devolution can be framed as another layer of politics.You know which people are not so keen on, but you know when when given a vote on a kind of regional Parliament you know John Prescott pet pet project voters weren't necessarily sympathetic and so I think there is a challenge of fine presenting the a new sort of decentralized evolve.Normal politics in a way that doesn't just.Uhm, reinforce feelings of distrust and more politics that people don't like I.I think the.Point you made around social infrastructure is is important.Places are important, but I actually think there should be more emphasis in the leveling up debate around socio economic foundations even before we get there.I think one of the reasons why that emphasis on on place.Valuable, but I think not enough is that actually trying a policy.A policy offer for places needs to not neglect things like early years, education, skills, health, public services.I think there's a real danger with the leveling up agenda and the focus on place that we we silo off a lot of really fundamental fundamental.Policy issues and policy weaknesses for particular places when there's still absolutely absolutely fundamental to the offer of what my town struggle is, is part down to skills, but we can't address skills, gaps and so forth without thinking about the the whole.The whole lifetime experience of people who are born in a particular place.And and I think it is the kind of final couple of points.I think the questions of local government and delay the devolution of 1 solution.But I think we have to consider them in the context of a shrinking tax and spending base.And as as labor has seen in various parts of the country, there is a danger for local party government being punished for by voters.The imposed by the center, and so I think it.Is all very well for.Us to talk about local government settlements creating devolved institutions, mayors, and so forth.But if we are in a context and a word that has not been used, and one of it's nice to have a a a workshop where we don't mention the B word of Brexit, but Brexit is fundamentally an unspoken challenge.Because if we are facing another decade or two of stagnant at best growth, how you know how does this empowerment of local governance?Its impact on support for progressive politics. If voters are increasingly disillusioned with what they're getting. If if it is local, if if power is being transferred to local governance simply to enforce cuts and austerity's that I think is a is a huge problem, I think.But the final thing I'll just say in this space and public as you know, John Johns organizing the seminar is the importance of identity, and I think the real challenge for I think there are two challenges around the devolution.A devolved governance, set, settlement around leveling up.I think the first is just the obvious leave.Patchwork incoherent nature.Our existing governance and about how one reforms a system that is so messy and scratchy and so negotiated with you know, you know combined authorities.In some areas you know mayors and others and so forth.I mean, how?Do we know is?This about just a series of spoke.Negotiation negotiated settlements in different places.Are we just going to increase the the mess of our governance patchwork and then the other I think.One of the areas which I first became really interested in in devolved government is about the role of identity in in in.In those government solutions, so obviously in some ways Greater Manchester works as a, uh, as a kind of political and a government solution because of a sense of regional identity, although.And having worked with people from Wigan and Bolton, there is a still a sense that those those read those micro regional identities are not always actually comfortable with power.Going to what they would see the center of Greater Manchester.And you know, and here in in the South, obviously there is a question, as we saw with some of the debates around, devolution to in kind of in Hampshire, not the Isle of Wight.It's about how one comes up with the devolved settlements.Say for example, a mayor bridging Portsmouth and Southampton, where people have quite distinct and divided local identities, and I think.Or or just?Weaker local identities?So I think that for me is is that real challenge for this whole agenda as to if there is is to be a sort of devolved governance?Agenda about what?Sort of, what sort of fundamental institutional architecture it has, but also what identity architect?If if we believe that identity is actually key to part of the success, for example of.The Greater Manchester settlement, as it is, can we find that everywhere and are we going to end up with more of a patchwork quilt approach to English governance?Well, thank you.Very much indeed, and I suppose on that that last point, how do we where identity does exist?How do we get?Government at the centre to accept it. I mean I'm sitting here in in Winchester where a combined authority bid from Southampton and Portsmouth, which was supported, was rejected by central government, not because local government or local people were against it, but because of some. This is public knowledge, not private knowledge. Some MP's were against it. Judith faced the situation.Where one Yorkshire was supported in Yorkshire but not in in in in Whitehall.So I'm going to come to the role of central government in just a moment, but I I'm going to try and do disservice to people questions, but by grouping some of the themes.So what I really want to do is.Pick up points raised by Ian Lucas and also Sarah Bogle.Ian raises a particular point about the failure of EU regional policy politically.To which you could probably add the failure of Labour's own domestic RDA strategy as a political strategy. They were abolished very quickly after 2010, with very few tears shared in most parts of the country and Sarah Bogle asked the question about.Whether there are.Other countries we can look to have got this right and how you go about.Doing it now, those are huge.There's a all subjects for a seminar in their own right.John, I wonder if you could say a bit about why you couldn't refold New Labour's ambitions to deliver regionally?I would suspect, and the money looks at eye watering compared with what's being spent these days, but it wasn't hugely popular with the voters.What what went wrong, and perhaps I can ask Judith if she's got views on international.Experience or places that she's seen that we can draw on.You muted John.Yeah, I mean actually on on the other countries question.I mean I, you know, I don't think any country gets it right, but I think few places get it as wrong as the UK does that I think that's that's my answer to that question in terms of the failure of EU regional policy stroke.Uh, New Labour RDA policy that and and and the reasons for the for the failure of that is that I mean.You know none of these policies were really locally owned, I mean.There was, there was.A great effort to persuade people that these that that EU regional policy was something that was constructed within the.You know that that EU regional plans were constructed within the region and that Rdas were somehow creating.Regional economic strategies.But we know that neither of those things is really true.You know, I spent quite a lot of my early academic career evaluating EU regional policy, and one had much to commend that they were not.Lots of up strengths to it in in, in, in, in theory.In practice I think in many places around the world it was not really understood as something that emerged from partnerships between regions and and local actors.It was seen as something it was seen.As something which.You know priority EU priorities that were being implemented locally through these regional planning mechanisms.You know in places like South or North East, for instance, is.Just take an example.During the Thatcher era, of course you've provided.And in theory at least, additional resources that wouldn't have been present otherwise in in a context where regional policy was scaled back after the 1970s. A high point, if you like an expenditure.But again, you know this.This is something which was largely.It was a political missed opportunity.By the EU.Really, to, you know, was largely, and it was.Not understood by local people.How this how this reflected?Their needs and aspirations, I think.And I think the same is also true with regional development agencies.I think you know you.You quite right that their weakness was revealed by how quickly they were dispensed with, even in the places where you know there was more support for them than than others, and I think that's there's an important lesson to be drawn from that.I think advancing the creation of institutions at the local and regional scale, which have a chance of lasting.Being strategic, even in the difficult context that will, without whining about limited resource.This would require them to have wide local ownership, and I think that's something which wasn't really the case on.The new New Labour.They weren't seen as having wide local ownership, and that's not to say that you know that they didn't do useful things at certain points, but they did it often in ways which.And didn't commend themselves to local actors, not just citizens, 90% of whom probably never even knew they had a regional development agency. But more importantly to people who would have been their advocates at the point where they they they they they came under threat. So I think the big lesson.For me in all of this is that.If you're going to.Restructure log on regional institutions.A lot more effort has to go into.Constructing these around a wide local agreement as to what this this restructuring is for and what the benefits are that that would accrue.Thank you Judith.Sorry, yes, and it's really interesting, reflecting back and and and just just thinking about how easy it became to undermine the what was happening in Europe and the benefit that regional funding brought into the country.'cause actually here we never celebrated it.We never acknowledged it.I remember going to Ireland and being really struck by all of the the the development projects and they had big signs on the side of most of them saying funded by the EU and you never saw that in.In in Great Britain at all and and it was almost an embarrassment of acknowledging that there was a positive benefit too.Being in in Europe, and obviously there's huge debate about how the Structural Funds are reallocated around the country in the real sense that if you know being absorbed back into Whitehall and they come out again on the unfair funding models that we've seen that that that areas that we've.You really did benefit significantly from regional funding.Are going to really feel that they've been left behind.Leeds actually wasn't a huge gainer from structural funds with a very large city and.They known as the 5050 city in terms of of affluence, but just thinking about the way the northeast used European funding to invest in culture and their transformation that that brought, you know, with the Angel of the North but also real investment in in culture in the north.It was something that perhaps we need to revisit and and look back.But UM the Rdas, so in terms of good examples, I'd say you know subplate countries like Ireland and other European countries much better at actually promoting the positives, although I the involvement I had through eurocities, there was a real sense that actually.It needed reform, and that's what we never grasped that the potential for reform in Europe and the dissatisfaction in many European countries with the model that exists.But Uhm, just in terms of regional policy, I I remember going to Germany to talk about education and being in Berlin.I'm asking.In the you know the the the local education leaders there, how they you know what the interface between the federal government and the regional government was, and they looked at me.And and in disbelief.And they said we don't have the equivalent of the Department for Education in Germany.It's all administered through local regional models.Responding to need responding to the local skills needs and the education system fitting around that.But in terms of Rdas, I think if I can be so bold to say this, there was a there was a problem with New Labour.And trust in local government and and and and a number of bodies.Health was another area and it was actively discouraged that that that local authorities would be directly involved.So we mustn't forget that regional assemblies were set-up alongside rda's and that was where that was supposed to be dealt with, but.It meant that issues that were so important to local people.On in, in A at a regional level like housing and transport, for example, weren't on the agenda of the RDA.So there you know for so many areas of every.Deal where where local communities would look to the RDS for for leadership, but it just wasn't there.It wasn't part of the their their policy makeup, so I think that's one of the reasons why it was so easy for them to be dismantled, because there there was a disconnect.But some of the work.They did has been enduring and you look at the manufacturing park in South Yorkshire for example, which has run through Yorkshire forward linking with the universities in South Yorkshire and that as a model is something that we need to look at in a really positive way of how we can reestablish those local connections.Working with our business communities.Getting the investment in because quite frankly I I think it's going to be a a very long journey to getting the sort of investment that we need from government back into the agenda.So I think we need to look at them and learn, but you know, there are so many questions at the moment we don't know what the governments are intending to do with lips.For example, and if anyone knows, then please do tell me.But where are we going to be able to recreate those those local strong relationships that actually help direct investment and delivery on the ground?Thank you Judith and I think that reinforces the John's point about the the way in which traditional views of economic development leave out key issues in the foundational economy and other most basic services.Well, I'm going to come to you for a different question if I may, which is to ask you to put your crystal ball on because we have a, there's always a danger of fighting last year.Battles a number of questions have come in about changing patterns, so Brian Moss raised one about the the retail footfall.Not going to the High Street.Chris Clark.I think raised one about the impact of COVID on ways of work.King Poluzzi ask one about social media and how that's affecting communications and how Lloyd talked about the flows of people.People moving by age and income to different parts of the country.So as one of the questions I wanted to ask you to think about is what's the position going to be like in five or ten years time?Will it be the same?Battles we're fighting.Or are these different social trends going to intensify the problems we've been talking about?Are they potentially able to relieve some of them?So it's a bit of a difficult.Futurology. I mean, I think I'm gonna start really I I think that I think there is a tendency with the pandemic to assume that everything will change and there'll be a dramatic shift as opposed to some sort of reversion to pre-existing patterns.So you know they kind of out support, you know.Outflow of people from London, for example this one.The people who are able to work remotely commute to smaller towns and so forth.And I think there.Is certainly a possibility.The the The, the long term legacy of the pandemic might be to how see outflows of populations to to more suburban rural areas with you know, and and see a slight shift of those.But I don't think we should expect a huge demographic turn around in the dynamics we're we're facing, and I think that in.In some regards, if you do ask me.About the stereotypical former industrial left behind town.I don't think the.Demographic profile, those places and the challenges those places will change.Change hugely, I actually do.Think in terms of, you know, the forces of agglomeration that some places, like market towns for example, which haven't to date, struggle.I think you know the the decline of the High Street is sort of a little bit of a marker about how places are changing, but I actually think things like automation you know.Traditionally there was a space.For you know.Professional classes in market towns.As we see things like for example law accounting shifting to automate or potentially shifting to alter more automated services, we might actually see local economies in market towns which haven't struggle.As much potentially being challenged, I think.So that I hear.In my little marker for changing economic geography is that certain sorts of towns that haven't struggled in the way that former industrial towns have might in the next 15 years and start start to see some challenges.I mean I.Think I.Just was if I may just jump.Back to the previous question a little bit.As well as I I think 1.Of the things.About to reflect in terms of the the past 20 years actually, and I think one of the problems that.Labor has, I think, is it's very it's.It's easy to tell an organ negative story about the regional policy under New Labour, because in some sense.It's a lot.Of the trends we're seeing about the successes of.Of cities in Greater Manchester are because cities were seen as a problem and and sort of and and city region policies were addressing some of the concerns around around cities and so in some senses perhaps some of the lessons that we should have, the kind of New Labour's approach to to regional governance and to to.Economic geographies that perhaps some of the same sorts of solutions that worked, for example for Greater Manchester that mean that Greater Manchester is see now seen as a success story compared to some outlying towns should stop.We should start to think about those in micro terms.For smaller or more peripheral.Places, and so I think.That's why, again, one of the challenge.Like this this workshop, one of the challenges I think for the left is not to get caught up in an overly negative story about we've, you know, we've never done anything with these places.Everything has been a failure and and and one of the truth is there's no someone is running expert on my.John is an expert on this form of I am is that.You know resolvingThese fundamental economic geographical challenges.Which are hundreds of years old is not easy, and so actually in that regard, I think it's so important that any policy debate doesn't sort of suggest that we can.Suddenly you know kind of completely rebalance the economy.It's about you know.Some of the.Policy solutions have to be out mitigating about making places better, better places to live.Yummy Johnson.Sure, everybody else would like to come in on that point, but I've let's pick those up later.I want to bring in at least one more topic if I can into the discussion which comes up in a number of questions, which is really about central.Government and the.Message you get in really in the in the webinar so far is that there's actually a cross party consensus in Westminster, which is that councils are a bit.Rubbish counselors aren't very good or very representative, and if you want something done you really need to do it and control it from the center and this seems to be with us for a long time.What John laid out.And I think Julie did too.And word innocence is the need for a different type of consensus.One that is far more respectful.Of the role.Of local communities and of local government.Uhm, far more willing to risk fiscal devolution, but also redistribution of of of wealth and so on.So my question really to you in different.Ways is is how do we bring about politically and this seminars being about labor, but I think it applies to all political parties.An approach to these issues, which is different in the structures of local government, the relationships between central and local.Or are we?Stuck in a position where.It's all going to be what somebody called in the chat, spectacle spectacle, performative mayors with no powers, but with platforms, hanging basket announcements to make it look as though you're going to do something and.Seems to me we can't really change something locally unless we change stuff at the center.So what's the strategy for doing that and what role can English local leaders local government play in bringing that about?Who would like to go first?Judith, you have come from locals for the Labour Party front.Game so if.It's possible it's all down to you, but.I mean.Well, do you know?Do you know what come?Uh, my.I think the whole COVID experience was a real window for many communities in terms of what local authorities do and how come the response was extraordinary.Phenomenal and this is across the piece.And and you know, we were.We were as leaders.Faced with dysfunction, quite honestly from central government and and a sense of.Being caught in the headlights and it was local government that really stepped up to the plate and brought all of the the different players together and really delivered for people in their communities.But what we?I think what we're not so good.At is you know, so for a while, the narrative when anyone spoke.Because we must thank obviously the health service.Our care.Uhm, et cetera.I'm local government for the incredible work they did.Holding the fabric of our lives together, but.Very often we too quickly move on from that, and perhaps as part of the narrative we need to create really establishes to keep revisiting the successes.One former Labour leader who is in the has been in the House of Commons isn't anymore said to me that one of the problems.Is when you become an MP.Suddenly your mail bag is full of letters complaining about.Things that haven't been done.Nobody writes them say oh it's wonderful.My bin has been collected every week successfully as was promised.You know that's taken for granted and and I think you know perhaps all of us need to really do far more to celebrate what local government does very well, and whilst.We've seen a you know, real reduction in direct powers for local government.I think the powers of influence at a local level have grown.And other players.So the the business community, education providers, all of the different players around place and and delivering for people in an area actually have a huge respect for what local government does.But we don't tell the story enough.And really, uhm.I think that's what we have to do, and through that, and make sure that everything we're talking about so delivering at a regional, subregional, regional level.Is about responding to people's real needs so the climate emergency is a case in point. So yes, we need to obviously be aware of the threat.The you know to the planet and the cut and need to reduce carbon.But we also need to frame that in positives for local people who are facing.For you know, financial hardship in a way that.We've not seen.For for decades, in terms of fuel bills, which for many people are terrible anyway.So how can we make sure that all of that is done and it involves people in the decisions that are made so lead to climate?Commission, for example, that we set-up now replicated into Yorkshire Climate Commission. The template if you like for the national work that's been done.Setting up citizens, juries, getting out, reaching people who aren't.Convinced about the agenda but actually going out and converting them and realizing that things can be done successfully.At a local level, it's a.It's a very empowering agenda, so there are examples we can use, but I just don't think.I think it's too easy to dismiss over the whole of local governments rubbish.You know?We know it isn't and there are very fine examples of absolutely brilliant work happening right across the country.And that's.I think we need to focus on how we can build on that.Celebrate that and therefore then make the case for more powers to enable them to do even more.Thank you John.Yeah, I think you know we.I think I think 1.Of the big issues in all of this for me, you know it's something which I I touched on the end and which will picked up on and and and Judith has picked up on as well.And this is this is this concerns questions of local identity and regional identity I I.Think these are.Uhm, crucial in this whole debate, and we we're not, you know that we must give them the attention that they they deserve really and.And I think I, I think, look.I think central government really doesn't grasp this, you know?So Patrick Diamond, who's one at one of the group who's who?I've been working with on this stuff for.Uh, labor, together, he's argued.That central government is like a.Manic man, you know?Pulling levers, trying to make things happen and discovering that nothing is going on.And it's, Judith says, in many places local government has stepped in and very constructive and innovative ways in the pandemic and reveals potential it doesn't exist everywhere.But it certainly exists in places, and there's an opportunity to expand that out.But within communities I I, I think these questions of local identity.Are really crucial to making to making these connections.You know, I mean, of course weren't quite right to say that you know the composition of places is to some extent.You know in many respects an artifact of you know wider social.Categories if you like.But there is something more going on in play in in these places you know.Certainly the villages that we're looking at this very strong sense, despite everything of of Community identity which is insufficiently recognized even at times by the local authority.But certainly by the state.In general, you know there is no engagement with this this whole agenda I think, and I I think it's really important.I mean, my view is that you know the the need for belonging and attachment.It's it's a.It's a human need and we've we have created an economic model which has destroyed the basis for forming attachments and feeling a sense of belonging to our community.So the economic model that we was talking about, which is transformed.City centers, it's really you know.And and you know lots of glass and steel and cranes on the skyline and this kind of thing has not proved.Used or is not dealt with the this the the the feeling of loss which is in in many communities which have seen their traditional ways of earning a living disappear.Nothing, replacing them and all the social infrastructures that developed around that vanishing.So to me the you know this this really.Requires a kind of localist response, and I think that the UK State Central government Whitehall is utterly in equipped for this task.They don't even realize that it is a task that needs to be.Perform and it reaches its absolute nadir.You know, in in in Dominic Cummings idea that he was going to have a big room in in 10 Downing St with all these screens providing with with real time data about what was happening.You know it isn't going to work, but.What if you?Go if you go to even the most disadvantaged.Places you find incredible.People doing amazing things to improve their communities and then the question is how do we unleash, enable and encourage that kind of activity?And that seems to me.So you know, I mean, I don't know whether this is something the low part is particularly interested in, but.I think without it.We will see that the you know the kind of stasis and decline that will was described as being characteristic of these places.You know and actual deep population that you know in in in some places in particular form of mining villages where people just, you know, kids just leave.Because there's absolutely no reason to stay, there's a great book by Fiona Hill, Trump's former adviser on.Russia, who's actually from County Durham and the title of my book is there is nothing for you here.She's the daughter of a Durham minor and she know have her father said they would get out, you know?And she ended up.I mean in in DC as a as a sort of foreign policy expert as a result.But it's a really good book on explaining.The qualitative nature of all of this.Rather than just focusing on the quantitative characteristics of these places.Thanks Jana and I I I think that kind.Of quality of.Story is actually.Really important, I mean.I think just a couple of things actually.The the Patrick Diamonds lying about the kind of pulling on the levers is something I'm sure that Rod Rhodes is writing about the core executive on the kind of the the the PM and the core executive go to pull the levers in in in Whitehall and they didn't do anything.I think it's a a long.Story about pretty, you know.British Government I think I I maybe have saying negative point and then.A positive point really, I think in one regard.But I think.The negative story about leveling up in place that we might tell ourselves over the coming years is that, you know, as we see the the current incumbent of #10 struggling with his various political problems and the potential success is not really being seen as committed to leveling up. Certainly in fiscal terms, I think.I'm I personally don't expect to see too much in substance in terms of policy, and certainly in terms of redistribution in terms of spending that we might.Actually see a a series.Yes, for in terms of addressing regional inequality, just simply because of the fiscal situation and the chancellor's and seeming a tight hold on the purse strings.And certainly as a potential successor to the Prime Minister, I think I can't see their post.Boris Johnson, Conservative Party offering a form.Of leveling up.That is particularly structural in nature.I think it will still be focused on relatively superficial spectacle around the high streets towns.Sentence micro projects and little things around you know, manufacturing and so forth, but nothing that structurally addresses these problems about.You know essentially nothing being there for people in places and.That wrapping that really.Unfortunate and felt quality for people in in in.Struggling areas that you have.To get out to to to.May make a success and I I think possibly one you know I I think.That is 1.Argument for progressive politics on the left.It should not try to engage with leveling up as a kind of coherent policy agenda, but just start trying to think in more creative ways about what, how it can, and I think this is where I'm sympathetic to the evolution argument, but I perhaps wouldn't frame it actually, and I don't actually the kind.Of the argument.Is it?Is it that County Durham needs devolution?It needs it needs.Community organization, places and people feeling a great.Sense of political representation and power in their local area.And I'm not.Necessarily sure that you know, kind of a mirror for Kelly, you know, I don't want.Rosemary for Kelly.Darren, but you.Know whether a mirror reform is the.Solution it is about communities taking back control to use the word of words of Dominic Cummings where he was perhaps right and.So I think.If we look to a more positive story.He's a quality.This story about places and people regaining power in lots of different ways, and perhaps not worrying so much about and not engaging with, the the rhetoric of leveling up because I think it.Is it is not? It is essentially set-up in a way that labor can't win on the policy. So let's start thinking more creatively in different ways about how we might address some of these challenges in a pretty tough context in the next few years.Well, thank you very much indeed.And given the time I think I need to draw it to to an end and I'm sorry our speakers had other points they wanted to come in on and there are lots of unanswered questions.Thank you for those who put them in in the chat.I suppose I abused my position after everybody else had the chance to speak world by saying that as one of those ministers who once sat behind a desk trying to pull levers from Cornwall to Cumbria and knowing it doesn't work.Actually, the reason that devolution is important is we can't actually achieve any of these changes without a far higher degree of impact.Empowerment, including over the use of resources at local law.Level, so I think the thing I take about apart from this webinar is it's a question of how do we move this debate for one that can be seen as a peripheral set of issues in peripheral areas that are only temporarily important because they've become marginal constituencies.To seeing these actually central to the future of the nation.We live in and the ability of governments or whatever color to actually deliver for people that I think is a challenge, and perhaps on the back of that I can advertise our next webinar which is on the 24th of February. Well, I'll be stepping out of the chairs.Role and be one of the speakers alongside Professor John Wilson at King's College London, and we've been looking at these issues from a different point of view.The labour assumption widely held that X gaining power means winning a majority of in Westminster and running things from there and we.Will argue that.Actually, that sort of statecraft has run its course.And there are very different approaches needed, so we'll be advertising that shortly.Hopes that some of the people who've been on this webinar will join us for that on the.24th of January, but thanks particularly to John, too many for his introduction, but also to Judith Blake, and Will Jennings. And thank you everyone for joining us. Thank you.