Like many of their counterparts around the country, Lancashire and Cumbria regeneration experts are trying to decide how the region should be run in a post-recession, post-election economy. But the two areas are taking vastly different action to devolve, subsume and streamline.
While Blackpool is pooling its resources, Cumbria’s development agencies are devolving powers. So what is the outlook for them – and which is more likely to succeed?
In Blackpool, home of the iconic tower, Golden Mile and Pleasure Beach, the urban regeneration company has just been subsumed into a new economic development company (EDC) covering a 14-mile stretch of the Fylde coast.
From 1 April, under a multi-area agreement signed off by the government last year, Blackpool joined up with the neighbouring seaside resort of Lytham St Anne’s and the port of Fleetwood under the auspices of the Fylde Coast EDC.
In addition, Blackpool, Fylde and Wyre borough councils and Lancashire county council will work with the North West Development Agency and the Homes and Communities Agency on the EDC. The move is in line with government policy to create larger, more powerful subregional bodies to increase wider economic and social regeneration.
For the UK’s “kiss me quick” capital, the EDC marks a significant change in its regeneration programme, shifting the focus from the purely physical to include the social, and many in the town feel it may finally enable Blackpool to put the failed 2007 supercasino bid behind it.
Fylde EDC chairman Mike Appleton says he wants to create an organisation fit for a “different world” after the recession. The scale of the area under the EDC – with a population base of about 350,000 – gives it a greater appeal when competing for funds, which will soon be in short supply in both the UK and the EU, says Appleton.
A bigger “interconnected spatial area” will be more attractive to the EU – and can be more innovative in its “financial engineering”, he adds. “This is the essence of our success,” he says. “We can’t be relying on public money. We need to be able to attract private money, and that relies on us having a private sector understanding and providing specifically packaged opportunities.”
Appleton, former managing director of English Partnerships, is not yet clear on what those opportunities might be, or the size of the EDC’s potential annual funding pot, but he says one of the company’s first tasks will be to review all the authorities’ work on economic strategy so far.
“We are talking about, and looking at, a general uplift in gross value added and income levels,” he says. “Fylde has a difficult concentration of social areas, and we need a much more ambitious, longer-term vision that can be monitored and measured. That’s the real driver.”
Personal interest
Appleton says the regeneration of the Fylde will be of personal interest because he went to school in the Blackpool area and has seen it change over 50 years. “It’s not been pretty to watch,” he says.
The EDC, although still searching for a chief executive, is expected to put together a three-year business plan based on the targets signed off in the multi-area agreement. These are relatively specific, including training around 4,400 people to NVQ level 2, but are built around making the Blackpool and Fylde coast a pre-eminent tourist attraction, improving transport links and housing, accelerating economic growth by 10% by 2018, and increasing employment by 4%. It is an ambitious bag of aspirations.
Back in the town, Doug Garrett, the first and only chief executive of ReBlackpool urban regeneration company, has just completed his final act – to buy Blackpool Tower and the Winter Gardens in a £40m deal, using mostly public funding (see p74). These prize assets will pass to the EDC, along with Garrett’s 18 staff (he is the only one not transferring) and will provide a significant starting point for achieving its pre-eminent tourist attraction ambition.
Garrett says the switch from URC to EDC is the “sensible and right strategic move” and mirrors many of the changes around the country in the past 18 months. “URCs are very physical beasts and it is sensible to broaden it out into a wider area,” he says.
Around the town, there is broad agreement that it is time to move on and acknowledge that, although ReBlackpool did not always listen to the locals, it did deliver some tangible changes, including a rebuilt promenade, new coastal defences and a £150m retail development.
“Our legacy will be a sense of purpose, that things change and can be done,” says Garrett.
Further up the coast, Cumbria is making very different changes to its regeneration and development infrastructure. It already has a sub-regional body, Cumbria Vision, which brings together about 100 different partners. Over the past year, the organisation has been devolving and streamlining as part of a complex plan to align it more closely with Lancashire council.
The first changes saw the creation of four delivery boards in April last year – West Cumbria Vision, Barrow Regeneration, Carlisle Renaissance and Eden & South Lakeland Delivery Board. However, the West Lakes Renaissance URC will survive, and its board will oversee West Cumbria Vision and Barrow Regeneration, which some feel is an unnecessary tier of governance.
Cumbria Vision has conceded that its previous approach was “fragmented” and “insufficiently focused”, and says the boards are in place to tackle those specific issues.
“They all have particular problems and need dedicated approaches,” a spokesman says. “We now have the infrastructure to spend funds straight away. We are able to make more of what we’ve got.” He adds that Cumbria Vision is very much the brain, forming policy and strategy, while the delivery boards are the hands, delivering on the ground.
With the reform of delivery now complete, changes to that brain are under way, with all “relevant” staff from local councils and the development agency to be brought together under one roof.
Cumbria Vision chairman Roger Liddle stresses this is not a cuts programme, but significant rationalisation is expected. Regeneration needs streamlining, he says: “Frankly, there are too many separate bodies and too many people getting in each other’s way.”
Closer together
Cumbria Vision’s chief executive, Richard Greenwood, stepped down in January, and as Liddle pushes the organisations closer together, he expects to appoint a senior council officer to run the agency.
But some of those involved are critical. “Everything is coming under the foundation of the county council,” says one senior source. “I have no idea who I’m going to be working for or where.” But Liddle maintains that the alignment will bring much greater focus and a “unity of purpose”.
Such complex changes happening just a few miles apart mirror the current state of flux in regeneration across the UK. Both chairmen, Appleton and Liddle, assert that their structures are designed to meet local needs. But Jackie Sadek, chair of the British Urban Regeneration Association, describes the regeneration industry as a “real mess”, adding: “We’re absolutely beset by approaches, we’ve got more structures than you can shake a stick at, and for every person doing one job, there are six monitoring them.”
Part of the problem, says Sadek, is the “policy vacuum” created by the political parties. None has been explicit about its plans for regeneration. In fact, other than the Tories’ long-held wish to abolish the regional development agencies, there has been barely any mention from any of the parties, she says.
Sadek, who is also head of regeneration at CB Richard Ellis, says the next government must be clear on what it means by regeneration, and she suggests giving local authorities a more powerful role. BURA has published six key principles to try to push regeneration debate forward.
But in the final few weeks before the general election, both Liddle and Appleton remain sanguine about what the future holds for their organisations. “If you look back over the past 40 or 50 years, the issues around transport, improving people’s lives – all governments have taken a role in that,” says Appleton. “Most governments will have those at the top of their tree. One way or another, we do what ministers want.”
What will happen in Lancashire
ReBlackpool URC was subsumed into the Blackpool, Fylde and Wyre Economic Development Company on 1 April.
Partners Agreed through the Fylde local multi-area agreement, the partners are Blackpool, Fylde and Wyre borough councils and Lancashire county council, the Northwest RDA and the Homes and Communities Agency.
Why EDC covers much larger areas and has a wider socio-economic remit.
Funding Authorities will be able to pool budgets and bid for a slice of UK and EU funding.
Vision Improve economic development, transport links, create a pre-eminent visitor attraction, and tackle poor housing and low aspirations.
What will happen in Cumbria
Cumbria Vision sub-regional partnership has created four delivery boards – West Cumbria Vision, Barrow Regeneration, Carlisle Renaissance and Eden & South Lakeland Delivery Board.
West Lakes Renaissance URC remains in place, but at the delivery level it is effectively split into two. Its board will monitor West Cumbria Vision and Barrow Regeneration.
Partners Cumbria Vision and its four delivery boards have become more closely aligned with funding partner Cumbria county council.
Why It was widely acknowledged that Cumbria Vision was not meeting the region’s diverse needs. The boards have been established to tackle particular problems in each area. Changes will also help to avoid duplication and streamline costs.
Vision Four distinct visions, including Britain’s Energy Coast, and a plan to establish West Cumbria as the centre for low carbon and renewable energy generation.
