It was one hell of a week in this part of the world at the beginning of this month, culminating in local council and business leaders meeting with the chancellor of the Exchequer at the Advanced Manufacturing Centre in Rotherham on Friday to sign a historic devolution agreement.

The substance of that deal is reported elsewhere by The MJ’s esteemed editor. The devolution agreement is of course subject to each of the constituent councils and the combined authority itself agreeing to accept an elected South Yorkshire Mayor in return for powers, responsibilities and investment to enable us to accelerate delivery of our strategic economic plan. Those council and combined authority decisions will be made after consultation, and require the successful enactment of the Devolution Bill. We will also be holding the Government to account to ensure that money promised under the devolution deal is not snaffled away in the Comprehensive Spending Review.