The Government is expected to publish its levelling up White Paper imminently. For those of us who have been following the issue, we are hoping it proves to be the long-awaited blueprint for addressing the country's geographic economic inequalities.

These inequalities are stark: two in ten adults in Barrow-in-Furness have a degree, while six in ten in St Albans do; a worker in Milton Keynes produces in three days what someone in Blackburn produces in five.