“WE LIVE in a country of two-track cities,” says Dermot Finch, director of the Centre for Cities think-tank.

Britain’s urban regeneration problems are more complex than the North-South divide, split between beacons of progress (“York, Reading, Preston”) and those that lag behind, with high unemployment and weak skills. “Cities like Liverpool and Hull are still suffering dislocation of the shift away from a manufacturing economy,” says Finch.

The Centre for Cities was set up to solve these problems. and wears its colours proudly. The brainchild of Lord Sainsbury of Turville, it has been “incubated” within the Institute for Public Policy Research since 2005. Despite its fledgeling status, however, one of Britain’s newest think-tanks has already made plenty of noise.

One recent success was the centre’s proposal that local authorities be allowed to levy supplementary business rates, which was picked up by Sir Michael Lyons in his review of local government. “We were really pleased,” Finch says. In the PreBudget Report, Alistair Darling, the Chancellor, proposed giving local authorities the power to introduce a 2p supplement. Almost a third of the £16 billion cost of London’s Cross-rail will come from the rates.

Unsurprisingly, the cap is not universally popular, but Finch says that most businesses see the benefits of better transport. “It’s only fair that they should pay their share. They have a vested interest in how our cities perform.” Birmingham in particular, he hopes, will introduce the tax and plough money into infrastructure. “New Street Station is a bit of a shambles,” he says. “It’s not a good advert for the city.”

The centre makes no secret of flying the flag for devolution. Give local authorities more powers and the budgets to use them and they will achieve progress faster, he says. But he worries that squabbles over power divisions distract from the main agenda. Ministers are “missing a trick” by not explaining the benefits of devolution to voters, and local authorities are too dependent on central government. “They are not used to thinking innovatively about solutions to problems.” With initiatives such as road-user charging, Manchester bucks the trend, he says.

“Think-tank” is an adequate label; “do tank” might be more accurate. The centre’s core mission is to influence policy and provide local leaders with real means for change. He talks of practical research, implementable ideas, action.

The centre also backs elected city mayors. “Stronger city leadership would be a better way of securing the powers that cities need to grow. Government is more prone to devolve to an individual with a mandate than some fuzzy committee.” Not all council leaders are happy with the idea of ceding power. Finch is unapologetic. “Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas. We’re not looking for rounds of applause.”

Controversy is pleasing, he says. “We’re annoying all the parties in equal measure.” He insists that political impartiality is crucial for engaging with council leaders. “People in the Whitehall bubble forget that Newcastle upon Tyne is run by the Liberal Democrats, Manchester is Labour and Birmingham is Conservative. It’s a very diverse picture.” His background as a chameleon civil servant in the Treasury helps. Most aspiring policy experts spend time in a think-tank as preparation for government; Finch went the other way and says he understands the winds of policy better as a result.

For the first time, devolution has cross-partisan support and a ready audience, he says. The centre has captured the Zeitgeist. “Ministers are serious about this. It’s no longer good enough for pockets to do well and others to be so far behind. This is a call to action.”

Born: May 30, 1968

Career: Graduated in history and politics from Liverpool University, and did a master’s at Queen’s University, Belfast, before joining the Northern Ireland Civil Service in 1993. Senior policy adviser at HM Treasury (1994-2005) and spent three years at the British Embassy in Washington DC and two years as a private secretary in Ken Clarke and Gordon Brown’s ministerial teams.

What he says: “People tend to blame a Cabinet minister for everything. I’d like to see a more dispersed blame culture.”

Little-known fact: Was in the World Trade Centre, New York, on September 11, 2001, but got out unharmed.

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