The prime minister has finally cracked it: regional inequality was never a policy problem, it was an aesthetic one. By handing mayors a cut of income tax, the government is not redistributing revenue—it is democratising art.
Think about it. A postcode in Manchester gets its own tax palette. Liverpool gets to mix colours differently. Every region becomes a brushstroke in the grand abstract expressionism of fiscal federalism. Forget GDP growth or public services. We are talking about the feeling of economic empowerment, rendered in quarterly spreadsheets.
The beauty of this approach is its vagueness. Critics complain the plans lack detail, but that is precisely the point. You cannot critique a Rothko painting by asking for a cost-benefit analysis. The prime minister is operating on a higher plane: one where “giving power to every postcode” means something different to everyone, which is exactly how you know it is art.
Will this actually solve regional disparities? That question assumes the government was trying to solve something concrete rather than create a masterpiece of administrative theatre. The real genius is that when it inevitably fails to deliver material change, they can simply declare it intentionally unfinished—a statement on the fragmentary nature of modern governance.
Mayors across the country are presumably waiting for the technical details, which will never arrive, because you cannot detail a vision. You can only feel it. And feel it they will, right up until the next spending review.