Yorkshire welcomes the ‘No’ vote

BUSINESS leaders across Yorkshire have welcomed the ‘No’ vote from Scotland but have warned that now, the fight for more devolution must be stepped up.

West Yorkshire Combined Authority chair, councillor Peter Box said that while the Scottish people have voted against independence, a result of the whole referendum process is that Britain’s political and administrative landscape has changed permanently.

“What we now need to see is all the main parties, who in the lead up to the Scottish vote have been talking about the need for more devolution and taking an interest in our cities across the north, making good on their proposals,” he said.

“That means a fundamental reorganisation of how government deals with the City Regions. Not a symbolic tinkering at the edges, so-called commissions or imposed gimmicks that some current Ministers might want to see. We need real changes that enable us to make our own decisions based on local experience and expertise rather than have them made for us by civil servants 200 miles away.

“The government has already shown it has confidence in the West Yorkshire Combined Authority and our partners in the Leeds City Region Enterprise Partnership by agreeing to give us the country’s largest Growth Deal and the basis for the unique £1bn West Yorkshire and York Transport Fund. And the fact that the LEP’s programme to help unemployed people move into employment, education and training has seen a much higher success level than the national programme shows we can deliver greater efficiencies and value-for-money locally.

“The Combined Authority is currently drawing up a set of devolution demands that include the powers to grow the City Region’s economy faster and develop a rapid, integrated transport system, which will support that growth.

“As I have said before, the genie is out of the bottle on devolution and I can guarantee the minister and shadow ministers, we will not go away.”

Richard Wright, executive director of Sheffield Chamber of Commerce, said that in Sheffield, a  No vote is generally supported by the business community.

“We actually have a lot of businesses in the city region who either have head-quarters in Scotland or trade regularly with businesses there so this result was important to us,” he said.
 
“We can’t, however, ignore that there is going to be a push for devolution across the whole of the UK and that expectation may well accelerate and even increase the scope of the devolution of funding decisions and priorities going forward. To that extent, the fact that Sheffield City Region has a Local Enterprise Partnership and Combined Authority is a positive.
 
“But the fact remains that if we really are going to grow our economy and start to reverse the national trade deficit, we have to decide what must be done nationally and what should be devolved – impartially, non-politically and not based on historical norms.
 
“If we argue that we can decide how to spend the money better locally then we must deliver on that promise and we must also deliver a better return from it than we have historically achieved. There will not be more funding unless we choose to tax people and businesses more – and that’s not a route I would advocate, so the only answer is to invest it better.
 
“That is why the private sector must play a major part in how all of this is done. It understands how to drive down the cost of management and overheads and knows how to deliver, and indeed survives on, a return on investment. The public sector has traditionally worked in a budget expenditure methodology and I’m afraid that is unsustainable now.”

Stuart Watson, senior partner at EY in Yorkshire, added that although Scotland remains in the Union, change and further devolution of powers will still be forthcoming in the form of concessions from Westminster and greater control for Scotland.

“This is still likely to fuel discussions at local level on whether or not there should be further devolution within England and Wales,” he said. “Noises have been made about Yorkshire as a potential candidate given its size in comparison to other UK regions. Business leaders across the region need to make sure they are a part of this debate.”

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