Projects in West may be worst hit by cuts, warns MP Cable
BOSSES at the South West Regional Development Agency fear the cuts forced on them by the new Government could be much deeper than originally thought.
Business minister Vince Cable warned yesterday that development agencies in the south are likely to bear the brunt of money-saving measures in the coming months, with government resources concentrated in areas such as the North East and West Midlands.
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There was also a warning that some agencies in prosperous areas, such as the South West, could be completely axed.
SWRDA, which is in charge of government spending in Bristol and the region, is bracing itself to take a massive hit.
Bosses at the agency have been told to draw up a list of cuts by next Wednesday and were working on the understanding they would have to lose about £23 million from an annual budget of £130m.
Agency spokesman Paul Harris said: "We were working on the basis that we would have to make savings of around £23m but the signals we are getting from national Government are that it could be a lot worse than that.
"There are already some painful decisions to be made this latest development means that those decisions are likely to be much more painful than we originally thought they would be.
"We are working to a really strict timetable and this will make things even harder We were supposed to get the information into ministers next week, we are not sure at the moment whether that timetable has changed."
Mr Cable made his first major speech as a government minister yesterday and warned that tough decisions will have to be made.
The business department must make £836m savings this year, a total higher than any other government department.
Mr Cable said he planned to abolish more quangos and cut back on red tape.
He warned that the new Government would "change fundamentally" the nature of RDAs.
Mr Cable added: "They will be turned into local business partnerships.
"In the north of England, we have identified some of the vulnerable areas where they will continue in pretty much the way they did before.
"There will be a strong emphasis on the vulnerable parts of the UK, making sure they have relatively more resources."
David Cameron added in Parliament: "On RDAs, what we have said is that in areas of the country where they work well and where local authorities want to keep them as they are, they can.
"We believe that in many parts of the country, including the part I represent, there is a huge amount of waste and it would be better to have local enterprise partnerships, with councils coming together to support business."
The RDA is responsible for several major schemes in Bristol including the regeneration of Hengrove and the £300m SPark science park at Emersons Green, where it has spent £10m.
3 Comments
by James, Portishead
Friday, June 04 2010, 5:47PM
“All the SWRDA does is to act as a fig leaf for the very powerful Regional Government Office, who put the various cases up to London based Civil Servants who make the decisions.
The SWRDA uis just another level of unrequired government.”
by James, South West
Friday, June 04 2010, 12:24PM
“Absolutely right StJQ.
You have summed up the situation admirably.
They will have to be careful with the SWRDA though because the south west as a whole is not universally prosperous - look at Cornwall for instance.
And even Bristol has large areas of deprivation with some wards amongs the most socially deprived 5% of wards in the country.
The golden egg laying goose may be killed off if they go on like this.
None of the national parties has ever done much for Bristol and locally they've all had a go at various times with equal ineptitude.
It's just a shame that:
1. Bristol's boundaries cannot be expanded to take account of the actual urban conurbation.
2. Party politics cannot be removed entirely from local government.”
by St John Quimston, Bristol
Friday, June 04 2010, 10:54AM
“Well, there's a surprise.
The Con-Dems are just continuing where NuLabour left off - pumping money into failing parts of the country whilst abandoning our infrastructure down here in Bristol.
How much longer must we have money sucked out of our region to prop up the North and the devolved administrations?
All of these Northern cities have decent transport systems, arenas etc - paid for by revenues generated in Bristol and elsewhere in the South, whilst Bristol gets nothing.
Bloody politicians - it doesn't matter what party they represent, they'll all the same.
Under NuLab, the likes of Dawn Primarolo and Kerry McCarthy didn't make a squeak about the appalling infrastructure deficit that Bristol suffers from, compared to the rest of the country.
I wonder if the likes of Charlotte Leslie and Chris Skidmore are going to actually stand up for the city, now that they've got their hands on the levers of power?
I doubt it.”