■ The major macro-economic topic of conversation in the region over the last six months has been the government’s plans to create a “Northern Powerhouse”. What this actually entails is still slightly vague, but what is known is that greater financial autonomy will be given to Greater Manchester to control its own spending, though not taxation.

■ The impact of the Chancellor’s announcement of this has been rather dampened by the deferring of plans to improve local rail infrastructure. However, it is clear that some regional devolution is impending, and our opinion is that this is most likely to favour Greater Manchester and the North West.

■ Some might argue that by focusing on Manchester the government is taking an existing positive story and trying to take credit for it. Greater Manchester has been a major contributor to the fact that more professional services jobs have been created in the NW than Greater London over the last 12 months.

■ Indeed, 57,000 jobs have been created in central Manchester since 2011, which is more than double the rate of growth that has been seen in either the North West or the UK as a whole. Furthermore, employment growth in Manchester has been faster than in any large UK city, with the job creation being relatively broad-based across sectors.

■ The strong growth in Manchester’s employment is down to a number of structural factors, including the City’s well established strength in financial services, business services and education. The City has also benefitted from the return of ‘Northshoring’, where companies are moving or expanding out of London and the South East to take advantage of lower property and staff costs. These factors are underpinned by a rapidly growing population, especially of graduates and young professionals.

■ We remain relatively sceptical about the impact of the ‘Northern Powerhouse’ initiative for the whole of the NE and NW, and the outlook for the NW region will have more relation to these structural strengths in Manchester than any policy initiatives. This will mean that a small number of Local Authority areas will account for a large share of the region’s overall growth, and the majority of these will be in Greater Manchester.