Most of what has been written about the Lyons report has focused on recommendations on finance.

Less attention has been given to chapter five, in which Lyons discusses the contribution local government should itself make to the reform process. 
Too often, councils and councillors lay the blame for all that is wrong in the world at the feet of central government, and fail to think about putting their own house in order. 
Sir Michael has avoided this trap. With the same gusto he deploys to advocate a new financial framework, he sketches out what he thinks the LGA should be doing to provide stronger leadership to local government; suggests how the political parties might go about improving councillor recruitment; and argues for more creative approaches to involving the public in local issues.
But the most interesting section of this chapter is where he concentrates on what needs to be done to reform the leadership of local government. And his starting point is spot on. 
He says effective local leadership is not just about getting political arrangements right – managing a political group, the cabinet or relations with the chief executive and senior officers. It's about ‘exercising leadership of the whole community, creating a shared vision which different partners can play to bring it to life'. 
That means we should be developing and choosing leaders who can ‘identify a direction of travel, articulate a sense of the future, and enthuse others to be part of a common mission'. Not a bad job description for political parties and groups thinking about who to have as an elected mayor or leader.
Local leadership needs to turn from being inward to outward looking – from being based on getting decisions through the council machinery to being based on coalition building and developing popular support outside the town hall among residents, partners and opinion-formers in the council.
Sir Michael draws on his political as well as managerial background to knock on the head the idea that this sort of approach is depoliticising local government. 
He rightly claims politics is at the heart of leadership of place, because it involves ‘setting clear priorities, making difficult choices, resolving conflict and balancing differing demands and views'. 
From my experience of watching ministers at work, that's a great definition of what governing at a national level is all about and increasingly, the same skills are needed for leading and governing locally.
Chapter five also tackles another excuse too many councils make for not facing up to the leadership issue. They say all this talk of leadership is fostering a cult of personality and writing off the contribution of other councillors and senior managers. Leadership, Sir Michael agrees, is ‘rarely just about a single leader'. 
Leadership is distributed or shared. It is undertaken at several levels and by a variety of players – including frontline councillors, leaders and mayors, and collectively, by the cabinet and council as a whole. 
The report does not propose one model of local leadership but argues that good leaders will:
l be visible – people need to know who is in charge and who to hold to account
l plan for the future – as well as being concerned about improving the immediate delivery of services, good leaders have a sense of where their place should be in five, 10 or 20 years time
l value high-quality managerial leadership – even encouraging chief executives and directors to provide challenge as well as support
l harness the expertise and energy of diverse groups of local people, public and third sector partners and local businesses, and encourage them as leaders in their own field. Here Lyons usefully sets out some criteria for effective partnership working (see box below).
Local government will, rightly, want to challenge central government on its response to the Lyons recommendations. But it should also take time to read and digest chapter five and act to strengthen the way it itself works. n
Robert Hill is a former adviser to the prime minister and now works as an independent policy consultant