Presentation by David Bishop, Corporate Director for Development
Minutes:
Mick Burrows, Chief Executive for Nottinghamshire County Council and David Bishop, Corporate Director for Development at Nottingham City Council, delivered the presentation on the role of the N2 Economic Prosperity Committee in shaping the Strategic Economic Development Plan (SEP), highlighting the following:
(a) the purpose of the Committee is to deliver the SEP and support economic growth in the N2 area. The D2N2 Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) has submitted a draft Strategic Economic Plan (SEP) to Government and will consider its final draft at the LEP meeting on 25 March 2014. The final draft will be submitted by 31 March 2014;
(b) the D2N2 LEP’s submission will be in competition with other LEP submissions and the overall deliverability and quality will influence the final scale of the Growth Deal, which will be agreed between the Government and the LEP in the Summer;
(c) the Committee might want to consider its status and whether to become an Economic Prosperity Board which will provide greater power and responsibility;
(d) negotiations are ongoing in terms of what the Committee should seek to ‘control’ and what it should ‘influence’ – the Committee will seek to control the local work programme in terms of employment, skills and apprenticeships. The Committee will also provide intensive business support for the growth of businesses and site preparation in terms of economic infrastructure;
(e) the Committee will seek to use its influence to negotiate ‘Opt-ins’ with SFA, DWP and Big Lottery. The Committee will also influence ‘pan-LEP’ loan schemes and major transport programmes where it can with the help of industry collaboration;
(f) N2 will play a critical role at each stage of delivery of programmes under their control and the Committee will coordinate proposals from N2 councils and organisations, prioritising and agreeing projects. It will be the Committee’s role to make recommendations to D2N2 on priorities for inclusion in the SEP and influence the outcome of the Growth Deal. Where possible, the Committee will seek to drive programme delivery and review performance delivery;
(g) there are demands emerging for funds in each of the programme areas, for example within Economic Infrastructure there is a demand for major transport programmes and access to and preparation of housing and employment sites;
(h) capital and revenue funds potentially available within the SEP for 2015/16 – 2017/18 identifies £150m for Economic Infrastructure, £55m for Business Support and A2F, £44m for Innovation and £123m for Employment and Skills. There is potentially, a total of £124m equivalent funding per annum available within D2N2 and based on a 50% allocation per annum, there is potentially £62m available to meet the Committee’s emerging demands;
(i) work has already started with officers in assessing potential projects. The proposed assessment criteria includes, the deliverability and impact of schemes, the contribution to unlocking economic growth and additional funding and the track record of the organisation of both delivering and spending allocated money;
(j) on 25 March, the LEP Board will sign off the Strategic Economic Development Plan (SEP) and submit it to Government on 31 March. The Committee will then input into Growth Deals as negotiations formally begin on 1 April;
(k) officers from constituent authorities will now work to pull together a list of initial priorities therefore it would be beneficial for the Committee to meet for the March LEP meeting.
Following questions and comments from the Committee, the following information was provided:
(l) N2 will be competing against D2 within the LEP to secure funding and, to achieve this the Committee must find a consensus before competing for funds nationwide;
(m) work has been ongoing by officers at a number of constituent authorities to present detailed proposals to the Committee to identify 5 or 6 major projects for 2015/16. Andrew Muter, Chief Executive of Newark and Sherwood District Council, has offered to lead on a list of district projects;
(n) Nottingham City Council is working in parallel to Nottinghamshire County Council in prioritising a list of large scale projects that are likely to be both deliverable outside of N2 and win the approval of the LEP and Government. Nottingham City Council will continue to engage with the business sector, the Growth Board and representatives on the LEP to deliver a consensus.
RESOLVED to
(1) thank Mick Burrows and David Bishop for their informative presentation and note the contents;
(2) to agree to hold an informal meeting on 14 March 2014 in advance of the Economic Prosperity Committee meeting on 21 March 2014.