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The case for English regions may be making a comeback, prodded into new life by Scotland's push for more taxation powers.

Thirteen years of Labour government have seen much promise but not much delivery on the regions taking power from the centre.

For much of that time, deputy premier John Prescott huffed and puffed, and got nowhere much, other than a humiliating rebuff to a very mild form of devolution on offer through a north east England referendum.

But now, with an election imminent, there's talk once again of more autonomy - at the same time that the Treasury's tax take is on course to rise by £19bn per year.

This was part of the thinking set out by Liam Byrne, Chief Secretary to the Treasury, during a visit to Edinburgh. His comments on the SNP government having to tighten the screw on its efficiency drive were intended for the party political battle, and they have predictably provoked a response. But there were more significant messages.

'Look in the mirror'

Byrne was announcing that HM Revenue and Customs is setting up its own advisory group to examine how reforms to taxation proposed by the Calman Commission on Scottish devolution could be implemented in practice. And while that doesn't mean English regions will get the same tax-varying powers, their future is being linked to the process.

The idea is to have something with which to run after the election, either for Labour's return or as a challenging set of proposals for the in-trays of incoming Conservative ministers. It might also be argued that the idea is to have some momentum on the issue, with which to answer Scottish Nationalist challenges.

For a recap, Sir Kenneth Calman's proposals were that Scots should pay 10 pence less on all rates of taxation, while having an equivalent amount of revenue deducted from the Holyrood block grant.

There would then be a decision for the Scottish Parliament to decide each year - arguably the most important decision it would take - on whether to match UK rates, undercut them which would mean lower resources, or levy a higher rate of tax than the rest of the UK to pay for a higher level of service.

With Alex Salmond having just fired off a request to the three main Westminster parties to hold off on spending cuts, Scotland Secretary Jim Murphy remarked: "The idea is to stop looking to London for more money and to look in the mirror for more money.

"Rather than sending the same letter endlessly to London, and rather than the superficial politics of generating unnecessary squabbles, folk in the Scottish Parliament have got to look across parties and build a consensus for what people want it to do."

Share the prizes

So much for that party political points-scoring. Back to the English regional stuff, and time for more autonomy? Not as much as Scotland, but, according to Liam Byrne:

"Calman is very significant, because over the decade ahead, we've got to ensure the UK has greater flexibility in its nations and regions.

"We've got to get power out of Westminster and Whitehall over the next 10 years.

"We need stronger regions in England. The lesson I've learned over the last few years is that Regional Development Agencies in England have been a godsend for economic growth.

"They've made an enormous difference in my region, the West Midlands, so I do think we should begin studying how that tier of government could be stronger still. It's going to be really important in making sure the prizes of the future are fairly shared throughout the UK".

Job subsidy

Other key messages from a meeting with the great and good of civic Scotland: the government's bill for tax credits has soared. We won't know how much until the election.

But there are clear signs of how much tax credits are being drawn into household incomes, supporting people whose employers have cut their earnings, often through part-time hours.

With the Scottish Trades Union Congress calling for job subsidies to keep people in jobs, the response from the UK government is that tax credits are already effectively providing that role.

In for the Skill

Manufacturing is making a sort of a comeback, but are the skills there to sustain its growth? And if not, is the Scottish government's training agency doing anything to help?

That's the message put bluntly by Peter Hughes, chief executive of Scottish Engineering. He's got some half-decent news from his latest quarterly survey. Larger firms and electronics are seeing order books filling up again.

Companies like Wood Group, Aggreko, Clyde Union and Weir Group are seeing positives flow from the weak pound and export potential. Operating in the sectors that benefit most from overseas government stimuli, such as power station construction in China, they're in relatively good shape.

It's a tougher battle for smaller companies, particularly in metal shops. Terrible figures improved hugely to the December survey, but still fell short of a surplus of companies reporting growing figures over those reporting falls. That improvement was sustained on most counts, but didn't get much better than December.

While optimism is on the up, the exception seems to be the fabrication end of manufacturing - though my most recent experience of a fabrication yard was of a business that couldn't possibly meet the amount of demand blowing its way from the renewable energy industry.

The Scottish findings chime with the Purchasing Managers Index for UK manufacturing, out today too, and showing the fifth successive month of growth. Likewise, the UK manufacturing employers federation found a return to growth from the start of this year.

Dr Hughes has long complained about the terms of credit from banks. No change with this quarterly message, but there's a new target for his sharp tongue, with his call to Skills Development Scotland (SDS) to "stop navel-gazing" and start setting out its thinking and plans for training in the sector.