My last blog questioned ‘What are LEPs for’, and made suggestions about how to organise to deliver different LEP roles and functions. Last week’s budget was somewhat disappointing in helping to clarify these important issues. Government is still (in Vince Cable’s own words) ‘lacking a compelling vision of where the country is heading’, and nowhere is this more evident than in government’s approach to local economic growth.
The popular nursery rhyme ‘What are little boys made of’ was the
inspiration for The Searchers’ 1963 hit single ‘Sugar and Spice’ (as a response to the question ‘what are little girls made of?’). As Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) finalise their 2012/13 Budgets and Business Plans, I have been asking myself (and those LEP Boards with whom I am working) whether they are now clear ‘what their LEP is for?’ and, therefore, ‘what they need to be made of’ in the coming financial year and beyond.
It is important that LEPs do ask themselves those questions – ideally in that order – because my observation is that we are seeing LEPs take on widely varying roles and functions. These require quite different resourcing, organisation arrangements, and responses/support from local authorities, business and other partners if LEPs are to be effective.
Need to do more than 'follow the money' to deliver local economic growth…
As we approach a pivotal Budget next month, now is an important moment to consider whether government’s local government finance reforms will really provide the powers and resources to stimulate local economic growth. This analysis can shape the steps local authorities (LAs) and Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) need to take to realise returns from any of these changes.
Views on Tax Increment Financing (TIF) have ranged from clamours for early action, to caution based on US experience, together with an English admiration (or is that jealousy) of the progress being made in Scotland. Now that the Local Government Resource Review (LGRR) Business Rates Retention Consultation, has been published, how does the development landscape for TIFs look?
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