Turbocharged! World-Class!! A Revolution!!! It is almost a pre-requisite these days for a government press release to ramp up the rhetoric. Usually it is a case of don't believe the hype. But when it came to the launch of the devolution White Paper, the rhetoric was spot on. Ministers were promising ‘devolution by default' to all four corners of the country, raising living standards locally and nationally. The proposed suite of powers was genuinely impressive to many of our members.
This followed years of County Councils' Network (CCN) lobbying, where we argued that devolution should not simply be the preserve of large towns and cities and that England's great counties were the backbone of the country's economy.
