Hands up who is bricking themselves?

The Government really is getting in a tangle over support for regions facing a heavy hit as a result of spending cuts.

The switch from regional development agencies to local enterprise partnerships has been rushed - and that was apparent when Business Secretary Vince Cable appeared before a Commons committee yesterday.

That comes as Transport Secretary Philip Hammond ruled out the A1 being fully dualled over the next five years. That's despite the Tories offering warm words during the general election.

Funny what you find out... There is a huge tug of war going on over assets worth hundreds of millions of pounds.

They are currently held by the region's development agency, but a little birdie tells me that national bodies want to snatch them.

That includes a £125m investment fund set up specifically to boost business in the North East as development agencies are axed.

I understand business chiefs have met officials from the Department for Business (BIS) to discuss whether a new regional economic partnership could take over key assets.

Buried deep inside the jargon of George "Chopper" Osborne's spending review is a stealth tax on councils - or stealth cut if you prefer. And we will all be paying for it.

The Chancellor announced a 1% hike on the interest rate for new loans provided to town halls by central Government.

Few people may have heard of the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB), but it plays a critical role in funding councils and services we all use.

It has outstanding loans worth than £50bn - the majority to councils for capital projects. Around £5bn of new loans were made by the board, part of the Treasury, last year. A 1% hike on that and you are talking hundreds of millions of quid.

The headline to the blog says it all really. While combing the spending review with an even more fine tooth comb today, I came across something very interesting.

It was to be honest buried in the footnotes, but will shock a fair few people given this tough financial times. Tory MPs are already spitting feathers over hikes in the European Union budget, and this may well cause volcanic explosions.

In the notes to a table setting out spending cuts, this is what relates to the Cabinet Office and its 28% budget reduction over four years:

"Includes one-off funding in 2014-15 for Individual Electoral Registration (£85m) and the costs of the 2014 election to the European Parliament (£120m). Excluding these, the core Cabinet Office settlement will be cut by 35%."

Expensive business, elections it seems.

So George "Chopper" Osborne has delivered the axe in his spending review. What does it mean politically in the North East?

The cuts present the most immediate difficulties for the Liberal Democrats in the North East. But they also present problems for the Tories and Labour.

The Lib Dems have most to lose electorally in North East. They enjoy a strong presence in local government, controlling Newcastle and Northumberland councils.

Is one of the themes of the comprehensive spending review going to be the saving of "white elephants"?

Even if costly projects are judged to not be worth it, I suspect there could be a few could still go ahead because it will too expensive to cancel them.

Whoops, Chief Treasury Secretary Danny Alexander dropped a clanger today. And it spelt out how painful the cuts are going to be.

Make no mistake - this is going to hard hit in the North East, where one in three workers are employed by the state.

There will be an "inevitable impact" on state workers, according to a portion of tomorrow's comprehensive spending review sitting on Mr Alexander's lap as he was photographed being driven away from his office.

And it made clear the Government had adopted the Office for Budget Responsibility's (OBR) forecast for a 490,000 reduction in the public sector workforce by 2014-15.

This is what I received in my email inbox from the PCS union (they capped up words): "The region already has one of the highest poverty levels in the country; the poor and vulnerable (including many of your loyal readers) will suffer most at the hands of these cuts.

I'VE got about three hours left of this eleven-hour flight to LA where I'll be for the next seven weeks training for my next fight on December 15, so I'm writing this blog on my iPad.

It may seem like science fiction and a curious coincidence given that Arnold Schwarzenegger was visiting No 10 last week.

But are defence chief worried about a Terminator becoming reality? Have a look at the UK's new national security strategy to see why I ask the question.

In terms of risks to UK security, it says: "Game-changing technologies, such as artificial intelligence, advanced web applications, and possibly quantum computing, will become mainstream in the next twenty years".

The terminator was definitely a game-changer...