Yesterday the Government renewed it’s emphasis on sub-regional working and announced proposals to strengthen Multi-Area Agreements (MAAs). Some members of the MAA Forum have been saying that they needed legal personality status, following legal problems they have encountered, and have been calling for Government to grant them this statutory status. In Alistair Darling’s Pre-Budget Report (PBR) he announced new statutory arrangements will be available to sub-regions.

The PBR stated that with regards to integrated city-region planning, within the context of the Single Regional Strategy, Government would consider the merits of greater flexibility over capital funding to support the more effective programme management of projects. It also suggested increased statutory responsibilities for strategic transport issues, which could involve greater co-ordination or joining up with with the new Integrated Transport Authority functions too.

Other proposals included:

• A joint board between the city-region and the Homes and Communities Agency to provide strategic direction of housing and regeneration spending
  
• A city-region Employment and Skills Board with strong employer representation and formal powers to influence provision in line with employer demand
  
• Integration of the DWP three levels of devolution model, as announced in the Welfare Reform Green Paper.

Crucially, if MAAs are able to negotiate statutory arrangements it will allow them to unlock a wholly new set of functions and interventions. They will be able to accept grant in their own right, enter into legal contracts and possibly raise revenue and host a borrowing capability of some sort. It looks as though the prospect of ‘MAAs+’ or ‘MAAs V2.0’ are now on the cards.

The Government announced that there would be at least two forerunner city-regions at Budget 2009. However, whilst these two sub-regions represent an important first step it is vital that many more MAAs are quickly granted the statutory status they need to drive economic growth, build economic resilience and further contribute to sustainable development in their area.

The PBR leaves a lot of unanswered questions regarding MAAs, but what it does say is significant and the details will no doubt become clearer with imminent Government response to the Sub-National Review.