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Geeks of sub-national economic development...
It is 10 years to the DAY that the Coalition Government announced the abolition of RDAs and commissioned the establishment of LEPs. Letter here for anyone who wants a read.
It is 10 years to the DAY that the Coalition Government announced the abolition of RDAs and commissioned the establishment of LEPs. Letter here for anyone who wants a read.
A decade on, has much changed? Still debating best scale/model of sub-national governance, still unsure which functions should be national or local, still creating new funds and new rounds of bidding, still ‘reviewing’ our approach on a spending review by spending review basis.
Few points from the letter to flag – RDAs had a £2bn budget under regional influence (NOT control – could say a lot about that) but LEPs got pretty much zero early on. This was a transfer to the centre, not, to the local.
With time, some resources have been delegated (not devolved). Emergence of new CAs from 2014 helps but still requiring national permission. Not everyone can benefit from that added flexibility. Still no coherent view as to what sub-national responsibilities should be…
Indeed, as I put here ( https://gcc.growthco.uk/media/1317/levelling-up-long-paper.pdf) we seem to be going round in a bit of a continuous loop…some examples below:
In the run-up to 2010 there’d been debate about ‘sectors/inward investment’ & whether best done regional or national. Concept in Govt was for a new ‘Industrial Strategy’ (New Industry, New Jobs) – it’s 2020, we don't seem to have moved on much & eem to still be working this out?
Anyone seen anything lately on need for strategic planning to by-pass the local? Letter is off in saying “existing roles are being scrapped, such as Regional Strategies” as this sat with Regional Assemblies but, 10 yrs on – are we about to go through this policy loop again?
New (short-term) funding pots, new institutional forms, new requirements for strategies, and new bidding rounds…been doing them for 40 years now!
Issues of unequal economic opportunity continue. So 10yrs on from the end of RDAs, and emergence for LEPs, where next?
