1. Citydeals in UK governance context Professor Janice Morphet, UCL 31 March 2015 j.morphet@ucl.ac.ukj.morphet@ucl.ac.uk Twitter: @janicemorphet

2. UK governance context – process not an event Devolution for nations 1999 and 2006 St Andrews Agreement Process continued through Silk Commission (Wales 2014); Smith Commission (Scotland 2015); Christmas Agreement (NI 2014) Role of British Irish Council in policy transfer between civil service (Clifford and Morphet 2014, 2015); (weak) FEA governance for cities NI (2002), Wales (2004), Scotland (2006) Reframing local governance in Northern Ireland (2015); Wales (on-going); Scotland - suggested

3. Devolution in England 1992 centralised regionalism – Government Offices for the Regions (GOR) 1999 devolution in London 2000 Local Government Act – general powers of competence Krugman/ OECD focus on FEAs Preparation for Lisbon Treaty – GORs fail EU subsidiarity test 2004 end of regionalism introduction of localism

4. Local government in England Moved from performance based to contractual format in 2002 with Local Area Agreements for individual local authorities (Morphet 2008) 2007 Sub National Review – move to FEAs 2007 Multi Area Agreements – contracts for FEAs 2009 Local Democracy etc Act – creating Combined Authorities, Economic Prosperity Boards on demand although approval through Parliamentary Orders

5. FEA formation 2009 Combined authorities process starts and continues after General Election 2010 Privileging of Manchester that started in 1997 continues 2010 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) – self determined based on ‘speed dating’ and time pressure – although assumed competitive 100% coverage in England – but not democratic; 2014 LEPS fail EU democratic and subsidiarity tests and are reduced in practical terms through finalised the UK Partnership Agreement

6. What role do city deals play in this? 1. from the view of the central state Exit velocity at end of Parliament? MLG contracts to deal with loss of power – subsidiarity Means of delivering specific EU policies and projects e.g. TEN-T ports, SUMPs Means of packaging devolution of funds Means of delivering other policy agendas e.g. OECD report on training and skills; EU 2020, OECD and IMF on infrastructure and housing Means of managing change e.g.effect of International Accounting Standards in local authority financial management; alignment of administrative and economic boundaries ie transitional local government restructuring/reorganization

7. What role do city deals play in this? 2. from the view of the local state Money Not much new power Another initiative in a long line of central devolution displacement policies Control through contractual relations ‘deal’ confirms power relations Need to deal with BLOs bits left over – need complementary rural policy

8. Governance UK challenges General model not specific initiatives needed to improve local control, confidence and performance Subsidiarity: follow French model for legal and financial tests for all gov actions? Devolution not transfer: downsizing the civil service not transferring to local government Strategic planning: new methods needed Confident local leadership: no longer local blaming central government