Levelling up, it seems, does not include levelling with us. It has taken a leaked copy of the white paper to reveal what ministers have in store for English local government – a model that voters have rejected time and time again. Under the plans, all existing 24 county councils and 181 district councils would be abolished and replaced with elected mayoralties. In other words, if your streets, bins and buses are not yet under the command of a Sadiq Khan, Andy Street or Andy Burnham, they soon will be.

Will that be a boon for local democracy? Hardly. Since 2001 there have been 54 English referendums on introducing directly-elected mayors; only in 17 was the answer ‘yes’. Ten were held in 2012 when George Osborne decided that our largest cities should all emulate London. Only Bristol voted yes. Birmingham, Manchester and Sheffield all voted no but later had an elected mayor foisted on them anyway.

We reject elected mayors because we can see where it leads: being represented by a jumped-up councillor or an MP who has fallen out with their party leader and is biding their time for a comeback. Such people pose as local prime ministers. In practice they are little more than beggars with megaphones, forever demanding more from the state coffers or puffing up their chests over things outside their remit. Sadiq Khan is the master of the latter art, with his performative calls for looser asylum policy and stronger covid measures. Meanwhile Hammersmith Bridge, one of his genuine responsibilities, goes unrepaired. Even Tory mayors are driven towards statism. Andy Street may boast about his £1 billion West Midlands transport plan, but it comes courtesy of a fat grant from central government.

It would be very different if local mayors had real powers, matched with the responsibility of having to raise all their own revenue.Then they would really have to persuade their voters of the merits of their infrastructure programmes – whether they be vanity projects or wise investments. They would have to compete with each other for taxpayers, knowing that Manchester residents upset at tax rises could always decamp up the M62 to Leeds. They would also be free to slash business rates to attract investment.

Instead of pursuing the competitive approach to devolution, our Government is following the failed playbook of continental Europe. Across the Channel in France, entire regional cities have fallen into the hands of Communists and National Front people. Powerful local mayors have proved a recipe for extremism and chaos.

Moreover, there seems little genuine public appetite for devolution. Every time some local body diverges slightly from its neighbours, it triggers complaints about ‘postcode lotteries’ and calls for uniformity. But differences between neighbouring districts are the inevitable result of devolving powers. If we don’t want that – and it seems quite clear that we don’t – then elected mayors will be a waste of time and money. Better that the job of local government falls to humble councillors whose titles reflect their limited authority.