IS Warrington finally going to get the ‘city’ status many feel it has deserved since the borough morphed beyond recognition under the New Town masterplan?

Cheshire MP George Osborne, in his Autumn Statement this week, apparently holds the key to whether we have ‘City Wired’ appeal.

Because reading the prospectus for the Cheshire and Warrington Growth Deal Bid, that’s the phrase which leaps out in these quarters.

From Warrington New Town to Warrington New City, riding on a countywide wave of £27billion growth, 112,000 new jobs and another 139,000 houses.

Council leader Terry O’Neill says we were wise not to throw our lot in with Greater Manchester in the great scheme of things.

Or cravenly kowtow to the Scousers like Halton, in Podium’s assessment.

City regions – or combined authorities comprised of uneasy bedfellows – appears to be the government’s latest wizard wheeze for devolving power and responsibility from the centre.

(As opposed to effectively starving town and city halls of cash and independence, with a much tighter noose the further north you seem to venture.) So with this essentially being the only show in town, Cheshire and Warrington have marshalled what they hope will be a winning package, to warm the cockles of Chancellor Osborne’s flinty heart.

Quite what this will mean in spending and governance terms – and even whether Warrington can unilaterally adopt a ‘city’ tag just because it’s in their glossy bid – is anyone’s guess.

But if it all comes to pass, plump for a few hundred shares in sign-writing and stationery companies, for whom it could be manna from heaven.

* Like many citizens, the taxman sent a handy note to Podium Towers, detailing how much I’d ‘earned’, and how much of that went on the usual payouts.

Appended to the back was a handy pie-chart, showing where my money was spent during the same financial year.

The slice devoted to ‘benefits’, being the largest, was probably designed to induce a Daily Mail style frothing at the mouth.

Let’s leave aside the fact that the Inland Revenue, an independent executive agency of government, shouldn’t be shamelessly rattling Ian Duncan Smith’s sabre.

And without letting slip top-secret details of the Magill Exchequer, let’s ignore the fact I paid more to HMRC than Facebook did in corporation tax last year (despite forking out UK staff bonuses of £35.4million).

I’ll cheerfully see a quarter or so my taxes devoted to ensuring the sick and needy or those families requiring tax credit assistance, keep their heads above water.

But Mr Taxman (and IDS), how would you like to hold up your end of the bargain and hunt down the £7.2billion being lost to the public purse through tax evasion and avoidance annually?

(Oh how I chortled when this was found to include tax-dodging footballers and celebs.) Then you can start on the £14billion or so in missing income tax, or the lost £12.4billion in uncollected VAT.

Each of these figures far surpasses any sum cheated out of the system by dole scroungers, by accident or design.

But then benefit cheats don’t contribute to political coffers all that much, or provide jollies for bored Parliamentarians during the long summer recess.

* Enough bile about economics and enterprise, it’s time for a few quick mentions of some things which are really worthwhile.

Good luck to another Boteler Class of 92 alumni, Joanne Pownall, as she ventures forth as the new(ish) licensee of The Brew House, Buttermarket Street.

And glad tidings to the Fairfield and Howley Project, as supporters stage their action-packed Christmas fair at Fairfield Old School this Saturday. Who knows, Helen Jones might stop by.