We welcome the recent Spending Review as a vote of confidence in our cities and their ability to deliver for the nation
Core Cities are already delivering for the UK and starting to realise our economic, social and environmental potential. We welcomed the Spending Review at our recent Cabinet meeting. We believe it is a vote of confidence in Urban Britain and an acknowledgement of the progress our cities have made across all of the Government’s missions.
It will be within our cities that the new money for transport, innovation, housing and economic development will have the biggest return. In particular, the commitment of £39bn for affordable housing in England over the next ten years, alongside the rent settlement and more financial instruments for Homes England will enable us to accelerate our delivery of new housing, sustainably and at high density, towards the target of 1.5m new homes in this Parliament.
We also welcome the additional grant funding made available to our Devolved Governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and to Mayoral Authorities in England. Confirmation that the Financial Transactions funding announced will also be subject to Barnett Consequentials was particularly welcome. However, too much of the conversation around cities and devolution centres on England only. Governments around the UK need to work with our great city regions in and around Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast which deserve the same recognition, powers and funding as English city regions.
The Spending Review also acknowledges the role that Government’s investment agencies like the National Wealth Fund can have in deploying debt, equity and guarantees to leverage private capital. As cities, we remain in deep discussion with institutional investors to establish investment partnerships that can deliver a pipeline of opportunities in land, property, infrastructure and business. With the positive changes to the Green Book to allow for place-based business cases that account for the complementarity between projects, we look forward to working intensively with partners on how to structure, scale and replicate the blended finance models that can share risk appropriately and accelerate delivery.
But for our cities to be successful, it is not enough to just invest in physical capital. Unleashing the human potential of our cities through tackling the deep-rooted challenges of poverty, deprivation and ill health is vital. The continued focus on public service reform was therefore encouraging. Commitments to reforming children’s social care services and SEND alongside a real terms increase in local government funding in England that is better targeted to areas of need will all be of critical importance to our cities. We look forward to engaging on this agenda, building on Core Cities role within the Test, Learn and Grow programme, and hope that policies on skills and work gain more prominence in future.
We await with interest the Ten Year Infrastructure Strategy, Local Government Finance Consultation, English Devolution Bill and the Industrial Strategy in the coming weeks. Government has sent out a signal that it believes in the power of urban Britain to transform economies and lives. We need to follow through on this with action and we look forward to working with Government.
However, too much of the conversation around cities and devolution centres on England only. Governments around the UK need to work with our great city regions in and around Glasgow, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast which deserve the same recognition, powers and funding as English city regions.
Core City UK Leaders
