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Northern city regions have 'achieved much'

Northern city regions have made good progress in establishing strong City Region Development Plans (CRDPs), according to a recent report. The study was undertaken by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) on behalf of The Northern Way, the collaboration between the three Northern Regional Development Agencies: Yorkshire Forward, Northwest Regional Development Agency and One NorthEast.

It confirms that the northern cities are leading the way in collaborating across administrative boundaries to improve their economies. But it also warned that much more progress needed to be made to secure ambitions for a transformation of the North as a whole.

The research by PwC was based on interviews with officials throughout the North. It considered how plans produced by the North’s eight city regions (Tyne & Wear, Tees Valley, Central Lancashire, Hull and Humber Ports, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, and Sheffield) could contribute to the Northern Way’s aim of closing the output gap with the rest of the UK.

It charts the progress made in the northern city regions to establish action plans for economic growth, and to prioritise investment in regeneration, skills, jobs and transport. It also makes clear that city regions have further to go to make the changes needed to bring the economy of the North to the levels of more prosperous regions.

Andrew Lewis, Director of the Northern Way, said: “The work on City Region Development Plans has placed the North in an excellent position to take advantage of the devolution of decision-making. We now need to take that work into a new phase, to ensure the North as a whole can fulfil its full economic potential.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .