Responding to Andy Burnham’s speech, Senior Economist at the Insitute of Economic Affairs Dr Valentin Boboc said:

“Andy Burnham is right that growth cannot be legislated into existence from Whitehall. His call for a more streamlined state, with decisions pushed towards local governments, is welcome.

“The question is whether we are willing to give local governments responsibilities as well as powers, together with regulatory independence. After all, the key to devolution enabling growth is the ability of regions to test different regulatory environments and fiscal programmes, and compete to discover which setups work best, incentivised by the fact that the gains from growth are retained locally.

“If devolution means handing out funds whilst keeping everything else bound by the same rules, it won’t make a material difference to the obstacles to growth we currently face.”