Alicia Kearns: Rural areas are not getting a fair deal

Councils that are efficient and keep costs down should be rewarded, not penalised.

Roger Gale: How duty-free on arrival shops can help the aviation sector recover and thrive

It would be short-sighted in the extreme to deprive regional airports of this proven revenue-raiser just as other nations are adopting it.

Street’s re-election as West Midlands Mayor would be a triumph for the Conservatives

He won narrowly in 2017 in a shock result. Another victory would signify more fundamental political change.

Richard Holden: This spring’s local elections. For levelling-up to work, we need local councils and leaders who back it.

The sad truth is that many local Labour councils and local bureaucracies don’t want it: they’re scared of it.

WATCH: Dowden – “Clearly there are challenges with international travel.”

The Culture Secretary promises “all options” to allow summer holidays will be explored but warns about rising EU cases.

Simon Jupp: To support regional airports, ministers should cut Air Passenger Duty

They are a vital part of our national infrastructure, serving unofficial but important Public Service Obligation routes for post, patients, and medicine.

Susan Hall: The 9.5 per cent rise in the Mayor of London’s Council Tax precept is unjustified

Khan’s latest virtue signalling project is his expensive statue-toppling commission. It’s an outrageous waste of taxpayers’ cash.

Grant Shapps: Our plan to supercharge the Union’s transport links can help make us Europe’s biggest economy by 2050

Our Union Connectivity Review will favour routes that serve this aim – be they the A75, the A55 in north Wales or the air corridors to Northern Ireland.

Andy Street: Here in the West Midlands, we have been levelling up for four years

From the start, I have made it very clear that I am a Mayor for the whole region, not just ‘Greater Birmingham’.

Labour’s claim that the Towns Fund is skewed for partisan advantage lacks credibility

These are areas that have been neglected for many years. The big cities have had rather greater attention for many years.

Richard Holden: The Chancellor shouldn’t try to win a spending arms race with Labour – which we would lose anyway

Perhaps the simplest way of putting it is: it’s all about economic credibility, stupid. Because come 2024, it certainly will be.

WATCH: Street – The Government “need to focus on retraining people who have lost their jobs”

“What will drive levelling up is not necessarily about roads and bridges but getting people ready for the industries of the future.”

Andy Street: I haven’t raised a mayoral tax during my term, and commit to not doing so if I’m re-elected

It’s not surprising that I do things differently, since I came to the role from a business background, rather than via the world of politics.

Tom Bell: Councils can rapidly accelerate clean transport by championing autonomous vehicles

As Conservatives, providing choice is one of our primary goals. So we should free up road space to allow this to happen.

“We have been terrific at pure research, and useless at translational research.” What our industrial strategy should aim to change.

The best way of thinking about it isn’t to fix one’s gaze on direct subsidies, but to look wider – at our failure to turn British ideas into British prosperity.