Richard Leese Articles

A Labour government should take on the vested interests hindering devolution, writes Richard Leese Writing shortly after a vote that shows just how divided Britain is, demographically and geographically, both within places and between places, might seem an odd time to...

By the time you read this the leadership election will be over. On a grey cold day in September, as the calendar ticks to 13, Jeremy Corbyn slipped through the door of Victory Mansions. And yet, this is not a piece about Corbyn. This is a piece about how opposition...

During conference season I chaired a series of fringe meetings held by the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy at each of the main party conferences. The topic was how best to achieve regional growth by removing the dead hand of the state. Each...

If our aim is to reverse ‘a century of centralisation’, as argued by Ed Miliband in his conference speech, by devolving power to local government then London must be included. Too few powers are devolved to the right level, meaning that there is a yawning gap between...