LEPs only have to have one-third business people, which would then leave councils in the driving seat of devolution. Ours ended up with two-thirds business and education (just another business these days) with councillors very much in the minority and in the back seat, or possibly even the boot.

How was that engineered and by whom?

We know that Paul Diviani has been an LEP board member since 2014 ( even though he did not tell other councillors about the LEPs role in devolution until September 2015), so he had to have been aware what was happening.

The selection process for ALL LEP members is shrouded in mystery … not a good way to conduct publicly funded business.