Securing Money and Powers

Empowering the region by negotiating a devolution deal and successfully bidding for substantial additional funds.

Why we have prioritised this

Further devolution of both investment and decision making is crucial for us to fully realise our vision for West Yorkshire. Despite the advantages we offer, investment falls well short of what we need to achieve our vision for the area and we need to address the historical lack of investment in our region.

Greater independence over decision making allows us to better tailor policy to local conditions, coordinate better with our local partners and innovate more in policy making and service delivery to find what works best for us.

How we will achieve this

To secure money and powers, in 2020/21 the Combined Authority will:

Following the agreement in principle, implement our devolution deal and prepare for a mayor, ensuring the Combined Authority meets new government requirements.
Influence the shape and size of regional funding (including the UK Shared Prosperity Fund).
Secure funding to deliver against key corporate objectives.
Maximise delivery against European funds.
Ensure the successful transition of our Transforming Cities Fund bid into delivery.
Complete investment of growth deal into projects by March 2021.

Policies and strategies  

The policies and strategies we have in place that will play a leading role in securing money and powers are:

How we’re delivering on this priority

Some of the projects we’re undertaking with partners to secure money and powers include:

Devolution: The West Yorkshire Combined Authority and the Leeds City Region LEP secured the area's City Deal in 2012 and a £1bn Growth Deal in July 2014. In March 2020 we agreed a substantial devolution deal with government to unlock significant long-term funding and give our region greater freedom to decide how best to meet local needs. We hope that this will be the first of many such deals with government one we elect our first West Yorkshire Mayor in 2021.
Transport for the North: We’re part of Transport for the North (TfN), England’s first sub-national transport body. TfN brings us together with the north’s other local transport authorities, business leaders and government to enable the North to speak with one voice on the transport investment needed to drive growth and rebalance the economy.
NP11: We’re also part of the NP11, a business led voice for the North that brings together the 11 Local Enterprise Partnerships from across the Northern Powerhouse. NP11 works in partnership across the public and private sectors to drive economic prosperity. In 2019 it published its Manifesto for the North establishing devolution of power and decision-making as a key principle for the organisation.

Monitoring and impact

We will monitor progress towards meeting this priority against the following headline indicators:

Net contribution of local area to exchequer: Balance between taxes and public spending attributable to West Yorkshire.