As chair of the Local Government Association ‘you are more than a spokesman [for local government]. You have got to be a player.' So says Jeremy Beecham – now Lord Beecham – and he should know as he was the first, and so far the longest-serving, chair of the association.

When the LGA was set up in 1997, Lord Beecham was leader of Newcastle City Council and chair of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities (AMA) – one of the three associations that was amalgamated to make the LGA.