Tom Forth is Head of Data at Open Innovations, Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder of The Data City. He is a high-profile writer on questions relating to UK industrial strategy, devolution, and regional inequalities in economic development. In this episode, David and Mike explore with Tom how innovations in the use of data science in economic development can help local leaders revitalise their economies. They discuss how these tools help us to understand the economic performance of Northern England's cities relative to their overseas peers.

Tom reflects on how improving our understanding of places is only half the battle: that without the ability or willingness to decentralise powers and funding to local government, the UK risks being wise to its economic problems but slow to fix them.