POTTERHEADS have been all of a flutter this week as the next chapter of the boy wizard’s life is due to be published, writes Rachel Anderson.

He deals with ongoing evil, magical creatures and no doubt a mortgage, moody friends and looming midlife crisis and looks back to the glory days when he challenged evil headmistresses and had some power.

He still has his wand of course, but waving it is a bit more challenging these days.

Also causing a flutter last week was Lord Michael Heseltine and any comparisons between the two are of course entirely coincidental, especially the part about the headmistress.

His Lordship was quick to say his report contained no magic wand and, for good measure, no silver bullets, but it is an affirmation that as far as the Government is concerned, Tees Valley has a sensible and deliverable plan to re-boot our economy and bring prosperity back to the area.

There were measures to establish a mayoral development company, transport projects and energy policy as well as some serious challenges on education.

On the whole, it was a measured report, which hammered home to Government the strengths and abilities of the Tees Valley and has given us the confidence to press our agenda forward within the Northern Powerhouse and in Whitehall.

It is in Whitehall where we are going to need Lord Heseltine’s metaphorical magic wand to open those doors previously closed to us.

The best projects in the country with the soundest business case and greatest payoff to the UK are doomed to failure if the right people don’t get to hear about them.

As this region has found to our cost in the past, shouting at Whitehall through a megaphone in Darlington will have little effect.

We might not quite have a megaphone in Lord Heseltine, but, as he puts it, his ability to “cough” at the right doors in Whitehall should get the right messages through.

It is significant that Greg Clark, the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, was at the report’s launch and we have seen a succession of senior civil servants in the region since publication.

Of course we do need to be masters of our own destiny and ensure we present a professional and united front but, this feels (to labour a metaphor), like the Tees Valley might finally have a crack winning the House Cup rather than trailing in last for once.

Rachel Anderson is head of policy and representation at the North East Chamber of Commerce