At the time of writing, we're living in one of those times for local government when, to paraphrase Lenin, more is happening in weeks than often happens in decades.  It's another case of everything, everywhere and all at once when it comes to the resourcing and the role of the local state.  Last week gave us the local government finance settlement which is important in its own right but also a precursor to further shaping of local authority financial governance in the imminent (wait for it!) devolution white paper and the restoration of multi-year settlements in next spring's Comprehensive Spending Review.

In preparation, and over the course of this summer, Localis has been returning to investigate the political economy of the South East in our first check up since we reviewed the region's role to the Levelling Up agenda (remember that?) as a net contributing area of vital national strategic significance whose surface prosperity masked areas of acutest deprivation.