Cross-border Western Gateway Partnership facing end of the road after UK Government ends funding
The future of the cross-border Western Gateway Partnership, established to champion the economies and investment potential of south Wales and the west of England, is in serious doubt. It comes after a UK Government decision to pull its £1m core funding.
The partnership supported by local authorities, city regions, businesses, and universities from Pembrokeshire to Swindon, was set up four years ago, partly in response to the growing influence of the Northern Powerhouse, which advocates for greater investment in the north of England.
However, after Chancellor Rachel Reeves first announced plans to end funding for trans-regional partnerships across the UK, subject to public consultation, in her Budget last autumn, the Westminster Government has now confirmed it is ending its £1m annual commitment to the Western Gateway Partnership, which will cease to operate in its current from June 6th.
The UK Government's rationale is that the five pan-regional partnerships impacted have English mayoral combined authorities within their borders that can now take on their roles. However, the Western Gateway Partnership said this failed to take account of its unique cross-border remit and where in south Wales there is no mayoral combined authority.
It said it had have attempted to engage with the UK Government and Minister of State for Local Government and English Devolution, Jim McMahon, on numerous occasions, but had been denied a meeting.
Alongside its core funding from the UK Government, the partnership has secured around £700,000 in investment and in-kind support in its last year from the private sector and local authorities. It hasn't received funding from the Welsh Government.
The secretariat of the partnership employs 10. All have received redundancy letters, with a few staff expected to remain until June..
Last week the partnership's Severn Estuary Commission, which was set up last year to look at how to commercialise clean energy from the Severn Estuary, concluded that the most viable route for harnessing one of the world's highest tidal ranges in the world, is through a lagoon approach and not a tidal barrage.
READ MORE: Forget Heathrow expansion we need to create new hub airports in places like south Wales
READ MORE: Tidal lagoons and not a barrage best solution for Severn Estuary says commission
It is unclear what form what cross-border collaboration, particularly in advocating for tidal power investment in the Severn Estuary, will now take going forward.
Successes achieved by the partnership included securing £100m from the UK Government and private sector for the development of new nuclear technology under the Severn Edge initiative.
Additionally, it has established a 'super cluster' to explore the use of hydrogen to decarbonise industry. It has also outlined a series of rail enhancement projects necessary to address decades of under investment by both Tory and Labour UK governments on both sides of the border.
While it will cease to operate in its current form after June 6th, the partnership said it is committed to providing a platform for the 28 local authorities its covers by taking part at the 2025 the UK's Real Estate Investment and Infrastructure Forum, from May 20-22.
The partnership said the event will provide an opportunity for all the local authorities to come together to drive investment and discuss future options for continuing cross border collaboration.
Chair of the Western Gateway Partnership, Sarah Williams-Gardener, said: 'This is a hugely disappointing decision from the UK Government. Despite representation from Welsh Government calling for talks on how both governments can work together on this, requests to meet from business and locally elected leaders and MPs, they have refused to engage with any of us from our area on this decision.
'It's been a great journey we've been on having delivered hundreds of millions of pounds of investment into key sites across the area; putting together a credible, locally supported cross border economic plan for growth which recognises our natural economic geography; and bringing together leaders from across the political spectrum to deliver for the 4.8 million people who live here.
'Whilst the UK Government have decided to put the brakes on this massive economic opportunity, I and our board of local authority leaders are committed to ensuring we can still deliver on our area's potential. The evidence our partnership has uncovered shows that our area can become the fastest growing economy outside of London and we will do what we can to achieve this, with or without the Government's help.'
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