In or out of the EU, London and other British cities need more control

Greater devolution to urban regions can help restore the loss of faith in government exposed by the referendum campaign

Were the prospect of a national government led by Boris Johnson and leaned on by Nigel Farage not blood-chilling enough, the referendum campaign produced opinion poll outcomes to freeze the bones. I don't mean those underlining how misinformed voters are about EU migration or the reach of EU law, perturbing though they were. I mean the one that found that 46% of those wanting to leave the EU thought the authorities would probably rig the result of Thursday's vote, and that more than a quarter of them believed MI5 would be involved in the fix.

Stop laughing. It's time to cry. Conspiracy theories thrive in climates of mistrust. Maybe some of those respondents were winding the pollster up, but the leave campaign harnessed deep cynicism about politicians, governance and anyone described as "expert" into one, big, overarching assertion that the EU is one big establishment stitch-up. The notion that shadowy secret service personnel have been deployed at polling stations in order to corrupt the democratic process may be absurd. But it is out there and it is dangerous. We know what extreme actions such views can fuel.