Life after EMDA: Leicester and Leicestershire’s Local Enterprise Partnership
In recent months, the Regional Development Agency (RDA) for the East Midlands region, East Midlands Development Agency (EMDA), has been winding down their activities and will eventually be scrapped by March 2012 due to public sector budget cuts. A recent Government white paper that was released on October 28th, 2010 provides a road map outlining the Coalition Government’s role in empowering economic growth driven locally in a post RDA world[1].
According to the Department for Business Innovation & Skills website[2], one of the main areas that this white paper addresses is the creation of 24 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP) that have been given the green light out of a total of 62 proposals that were received by the Government. LEPs are expected to formally launch in April 2011. The main criteria for evaluating proposals included looking at the whether proposals will be able to provide support for business, local authority support, added value and ambition and attention towards economic geography. In awarding these proposals, the Coalition Government is aiming to rebalance the economy while shifting more power to local communities and businesses. One of the successful proposals came from the Leicester & Leicestershire region.
List of Approved LEPs
Providing a few details about their recently approved LEP proposal, the Leicestershire County Council website explains[3]:
A new joint governance structure, in the form of the Leadership Board, has been established to drive forward economic development in the sub-region. In addition, a new delivery vehicle, Prospect Leicestershire, has been established to deliver economic growth. The operational management of the LLEP is undertaken by a sub-regional support unit hosted by Leicester City Council.
Leicester City Council has also uploaded a copy of their LEP proposal and covering letter on their website for further information[4]. At this stage, everything is still in early planning stages. What is clear is that the LEP board for Leicester and Leicestershire will comprise of 50% private sector and 50% public and third sector members. The Board will be chaired by a leading business representative:
- 7 Business representatives
- Leicester, De Montfort or Loughborough University representative
- 2 Leicestershire County Council elected representatives
- 2 Leicester City Council elected representatives
- 2 District Council elected representatives (representing 7 Districts)
- Voluntary and community sector representative
Moreover, their key objectives will include to:
- Improve productivity, increase wealth creation and encourage sustainable private sector growth.
- Create a balanced, sustainable and competitive knowledge-based economy.
- Address the physical requirements for success.
However, there are some concerns about what the future has in store for LEPS in this county and throughout England. A few of these issues were raised at CREME’s Annual Ethnic Minority Business Conference on October 14th, 2010 in Coventry. During a presentation from David Draycott who was involved with a LEP proposal for the Bristol area, public sector officials and business owners that attended the conference complained how several of the LEP proposals put more importance on the place and people agenda at the expense of business support. Moreover, some of the programmes that just began to be useful through EMDA are being cut. Finally, very few LEP proposals addressed the issues of diversity in their proposals including the proposal from Leicester and Leicestershire.
While it is still early to judge the potential effectiveness of LEPs, what is clear is that LEPs will be a key future provider and stimulator of business support throughout England. Furthermore, in certain regions such as the East Midlands, they will have large shoes to fill due to EMDA’s many successful initiatives and the general dissatisfaction and disappointment expressed by several people in relation to the demise of EMDA at the CREME conference.
If you are interested in obtaining a copy of the report from the CREME conference once it will be available, please email creme@dmu.ac.uk.[2] http://www.bis.gov.uk/news/topstories/2010/Oct/local-growth [3] http://www.leics.gov.uk/index/business/advice_guidance/llep.htm
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