Last year's resounding referendum defeat halted plans for an elected regional assembly. So where does the North-East go from here? The Northern Echo hosted a fringe meeting at the Labour Party spring conference in The Sage, Gateshead, and asked four of the region's figureheads to give their views of the future.

Alan Milburn MP Labour election supremo

Democracy spoke and we lost. It's no bad thing to listen when one point of view is defeated in a democratic process and to learn from it.

It isn't impossible in future times that regional government in one way, shape or form may come back.

But the issue now is where we move to.

Firstly, the principle of regional government might have been defeated, but the issue of regional policy must not be.

A remarkable renaissance has taken place in our region.

More people are in work, and we have industry and business expanding in a way which many of us never thought possible in the dark days of the 1980s.

However, regional disparity and regional inequality remains - our unemployment is twice that of the South-East, and our children born in this part of the world tend to be less well and have shorter lives than elsewhere in the country.

As we live in a civilised world in the 21st Century, these sorts of inequalities should belong in the past.

It is important that Government money is distributed fairly. Not everything has to be in London. We need to ensure that civil service jobs are distributed fairly - not all should be in London.

The second point is that the process of devolution must continue.

People are taking refuge in the things they know: their families, their communities and their regions - it is happening everywhere. It is not a bad thing and we should go with it.

I think we have learned from the regional government debate, and from Ray Mallon's experience making a difference on the streets of Middlesbrough as a mayor.

We have to reinvigorate local government, and the local councils. It is important that we have forms of local accountability.

Very often, the demand comes from below - from the local neighbourhood. The issue is, how we can empower the local community to have a bigger say.

Darlington is a small town, but with big differences. Different communities want to have their say. If a local community wants to take a bit more power and raise a bit more money to employ a park or street warden, why shouldn't it be able to do so?

It is about giving power to people, real power in the hands of local people. We need to drive forward to a more devolved system of governance in this country.

We need to find forms of governance which are about building communities from the bottom up, not top down.

Although people have a very strong sense of identity, where they identify with most is the community or the town. If we are committed to democratising, we need to get the structures of democracy at the right level - local communities.

John Elliott North-East Says No

I couldn't disagree with a word Alan Milburn said. I am not against local decision making, I just thought the region was too remote.

If there are structural disparities, that's for the Government or for Brussels to deal with. We will do well in the North-East if the country does well - we don't want any more or less than the rest of the country, we only want our fair share.

Beneath that, all we need is the local level which, as Alan says, is street by street. We can't treat Darlington as one place - the people of Darlington are individuals with their own needs.

I sometimes believe that politicians believe their own spin and PR and we get the impression that politicians are articulate and can say what they will do, but they don't actually do anything.

People feel instinctively that they can't influence politicians so they don't bother. People don't think they can influence the county council, but they do things in their own community.

I think mayors are a great idea, mayors are accountable. Ray Mallon has his name on his job. Most people don't know who the leader of Wear Valley District Council or Durham County Council is but they know who Ray Mallon is.

I wouldn't have had a problem with the Government saying that it was going to give us regional assemblies - that's what we elect them for: to use their judgement to do things.

But I was surprised that we got a chance to have a referendum which cost £12m, then they sort of ignored the result by keeping the unelected assembly. Durham County Council is still paying £80,000 a year to that assembly - it is ignoring the people.

What I have heard since the referendum is the Government saying that it didn't get the message across, not that it got the message wrong in the first place.

Andrew Sugden North-East Chamber of Commerce

Director of Policy, North-East Chamber of Commerce

We polled our members early in 2004 and asked them which way they were likely to vote and they were split fairly evenly: 30 per cent yes, 30 per cent no and 40 per cent undecided.

It was only with the publication of the Bill setting out the responsibilities of any assembly that we saw resolve harden against it.

And so the referendum was about a regional policy which had fallen far short of expectations.

But it opened up a series of issues. We found the amount of focus put on the referendum was very encouraging - our members were pushing for a real sense of devolution of decision-making on transport, education, a whole portfolio of decision-making, decisions taken by mandarins in Whitehall.

We now have a halfway house with the regional development agency, the Government Office and the unelected assembly. But I think it is dangerous to talk about demolishing that half way house.

The problem is we have these structures which are effectively designed to have a democratic mandate alongside them but now we don't have the answer as to how to get that democratic mandate.

While some see the referendum as an endorsement for the tearing down of England's regional governance structures, others, myself included, counsel against throwing the baby out with the bath water.

The status quo has its flaws, but reverting to a situation where all major decisions affecting transport, skills, planning and economic development are made in Whitehall must be a retrograde step.

There needs to be a much more thoughtful approach.

Ray Mallon Middlesbrough Mayor

Most politicians, not all, think about their own backyards. They don't think strategically.

The public don't see boundaries at all around Middlesbrough, Darlington or Newcastle. Only the politicians do.

The No campaign appealed to the prejudices of the people on two counts. About politicians and people paying more money - and people don't like doing either.

We need co-ordination, we need a bringing together. I am not interested in the four sub-regions of the North-East - of the Tees Valley, County Durham, Tyneside and Northumberland. I am actually interested in one. One for all. All for one. I am interested in harmonisation.

If there is something going on in Redcar and Cleveland or Hartlepool or Durham City that is to the detriment of Middlesbrough in the short-term but which is good in the long-term, then I am going to support it. I ask the people of Middlesbrough to trust my judgement, because I am going to make the decisions. And if they don't like those decisions, in 2007 they can get rid of me. I am accountable.

All the powers that a regional government would have had had are here - Government Office North-East and One NorthEast, the regional development agency (RDA), remain. Both are quangos, like the more than 230 others in this country, spending billions and billions. These quangos aren't accountable to anybody - but a regional government could have done that. With it, we could have got more efficiency and more effectiveness.

They are quangos run by civil servants. Tony Blair doesn't run this country on a day-to-day basis and Ray Mallon doesn't run Middlesbrough on a day-to-day basis, the civil servants do. The civil servants are not accountable.

I am not sure what the alternative to regional government is. But I know the RDA and the regional assembly have more responsibilities now, even though every single council ward in the North-East said no - and that is disrespectful to the public.

The elected mayoral system might work, because the bottom line is, it is about leadership, motivation and influence.

The politicians of the North-East have disrespected this region disgracefully. I believe if we get the bean counters out, we would realise that the North-East has done more for the British economy than any other region. We should be more competitive, more confident, more aggressive and never disrespect the North-East again.