About the Inquiry
Image: Chris Brown
Remit
The remit of the Committee's inquiry is—
To explore rationale, prioritisation and value for money in relation to city region deals, including the progress to date of city region deals in delivering job creation and economic growth, and the structure and governance of city region deals in Scotland.
Background
In December 2011, the UK Government launched City Deals as part of its Unlocking Growth in Cities White Paper. City deals are agreements between the UK Government and cities (through their local authority) to give local areas across the UK specific powers and freedoms to help the region support economic growth, create jobs or invest in local projects.
The first wave of City Deals, launched in July 2012, covered the eight largest cities in England outside of London – Birmingham, Bristol, Greater Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool, Nottingham, Newcastle and Sheffield.
A further 18 city deals, covering the next 14 largest cities in England outside London, along with the six cities with the highest population growth between 2001 and 2010, were agreed between September 2013 and July 2014. Subsequent Growth Deals were rolled out to a number of Local Enterprise Partnerships in July 2014 and January 2015, and Devolution Deals transferring powers, funding and accountability for policies out to local regions were introduced across the latter half of 2015 and early 2016.
In Scotland, City Deals include the Scottish Government as partners and are referred to as "City region deals". The Scottish Government explains that they offer the potential for new collaborative regional partnerships, focused on long-term strategic approaches to improving regional economies in accordance with the Scottish Government's economic strategy. Three City Deals in Scotland have been agreed to date.
The Audit Scotland/Accounts Commission briefing, City Deals Overview, gives an overview of the deals’ introduction and update on progress up to May 2016, and the House of Commons Library briefing on City Deals gives a brief update to November 2016. The three agreed City Deals are Glasgow City Region Deal, Aberdeen City Region Deal and Inverness and Highland City Region Deal. A further nine councils are currently preparing City Deal bids.
The Scottish Parliament Information Centre’s briefing on City Region Deals gives further information on the background to and progress of City Region Deals.
SPICe Overview Update
The Scottish Parliament Information Centre has produced the following update on the progress of City Region Deals:
Evidence
Call for Views
The Committee launched a call for written evidence on Tuesday 4 April 2017 from all interested parties as part of its scrutiny of city region deals.
Organisations and individuals were invited to submit written evidence to the Committee setting out their views on whether City Region Deals are on course to deliver local economic growth and major infrastructure projects in line with their original proposals. This could include views on the effectiveness of shifting responsibility for local economic development to local leaders through joint working initiatives.
For further details on the Committee's call for written evidence, please see the link below.
Read the call for evidence
Read the news release on the call for evidence
Written Submissions
Read the written submissions received.
Oral Evidence
Wednesday 1 November 2017
The Committee took evidence from:
- Professor Duncan Maclennan, Policy Scotland, University of Glasgow;
- Dr Peter O'Brien, Research Associate, Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies, Newcastle University;
- Lesley Warren, Policy and Public Affairs Officer, Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights;
- Barry McCulloch, Senior Policy Adviser, Federation of Small Businesses;
- Chris Day, Policy Advisor, Transform Scotland.
Link to Papers for meeting on 1 November 2017
Link to Official Report of meeting on 1 November 2017
Wednesday 8 November 2017
The Committee took evidence from:
- Cllr Susan Aitken, Chair, Glasgow City Region Cabinet and Leader of Glasgow City Council;
- Kevin Rush, Director of Regional Economic Growth, Glasgow City Region Deal;
- Cllr Adam McVey, Leader, City of Edinburgh Council, and Andrew Kerr, Chief Executive, City of Edinburgh Council, Edinburgh and South-East Scotland City Region Deal Partners;
- Cllr Graham Ross, Depute Provost and Leader of Inverness and Area, and John Robertson, Programme Manager, City Region Deal, Highland Council;
- Cllr David Ross, Co-Leader, Fife Council;
- Cllr Jenny Laing, Co-Leader, and Richard Sweetnam, Head of Economic Development, Aberdeen City Council.
Link to Papers for meeting on 8 November 2017
Link to Official Report of meeting on 8 November 2017
Follow-up Correspondence from the meeting on 8 November 2017
The local authorities noted below provided follow-up correspondence to the Committee after the meeting on 8 November 2017:
Wednesday 15 November 2017
The Committee took evidence from:
- Patrick Wiggins, Director, Ayrshire Growth Deal;
- Douglas Duff, Head of Planning and Economic Development, Falkirk Council;
- Phil Ford, Regional Skills Planning Lead, and Paul Zealey, Regional Skills Planning Lead, Skills Development Scotland.
Link to Papers for meeting on 15 November 2017
Link to Official Report of meeting on 15 November 2017
Wednesday 22 November 2017
The Committee took evidence from:
- Keith Brown, Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work, Oonagh Gil, Deputy Director, Enterprise and Cities, and Morag Watt, Head of Region and City Partnerships Team, Scottish Government;
- Lord Duncan of Springbank, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Scotland, and Neil MacLennan, Head of City Deals and Local Government, Scotland Office, UK Government.
Link to Papers for meeting on 22 November 2017
Link to Official Report of meeting on 22 November 2017
On 11 December 2017, the Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work wrote to the Committee following up the evidence session on 22 November 2017:
Wednesday 13 June 2018
Following the publication of the Committee's report and the responses received from the Scottish and UK Governments, the Committee took evidence on Wednesday 13 June 2018 from:
- Keith Brown, Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work, Morag Watt, Head of Region and City Partnerships Team, and Marion McCormack, Head of Better Regulation and Enterprise Sponsorship, Scottish Government.
Link to Papers for meeting on 13 June 2018
Link to Official Report of meeting on 13 June 2018
The Committee considered its work programme on 23 January 2019 and agreed to hold further evidence sessions to take stock of City Region Deals, with a focus on what sort of economic output was being achieved by the longer-established deals, and consideration of whether deals had achieved measurable economic growth or had caused economic displacement, to the detriment of non-deal areas.
See Current Business - City Region Deals page for further information.
Visits and Events
Committee Visit to Paisley on 6 November 2017
The Committee visited Paisley on 6 November 2017 and met with a range of local representatives from the Glasgow and Renfrewshire area to discuss the Glasgow City Region Deal. A note of the key points made by the local representatives during the discussion is available below:
Correspondence
The Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work wrote to the Committee on 21 August 2017 in relation to the Edinburgh and South East Scotland City Region Deal:
The Glasgow City Region Cabinet wrote to the Convener on 7 March 2018:
The Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work wrote to the Committee on 7 June 2018 in relation to the Stirling and Clackmannanshire City Region Deal:
Following the evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Jobs and Fair Work on 13 June 2018, the Committee agreed to invite the UK Government, representatives of the Glasgow City Region Deal and representatives of the Stirling and Clackmannanshire City Region Deal to give evidence at future meetings:
The Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Infrastructure and Connectivity wrote to the Committee with more information about City Region Deals, in a follow-up to the 13 June evidence session:
The three Island Councils of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar, Orkney Islands Council and Shetland Islands Council wrote to the Convener on 6 July 2018 giving details of their proposal for an Islands Deal. The Convener responded on 30 July 2018:
The three Island Councils responded to the Convener's letter of 30 July 2018 on 31 August 2018:
The Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Infrastructure and Connectivity wrote to the Committee on 28 November 2018 in relation to the Tay Cities city region deal:
Report
The Committee's report was published on 9 January 2018:
The Scottish Government responded to the Committee's report on 13 March 2018:
The UK Government responded to the Committee's report on 10 April 2018: