Shared Prosperity Fund — [Sir David Crausby in the Chair]

Part of the debate – in Westminster Hall at 2:30 pm on 14 May 2019.

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Photo of Dan Jarvis Dan Jarvis Labour, Barnsley Central 2:30, 14 May 2019

My hon. Friend speaks with great authority on these matters. He has put his finger on the nub of the issue, which is that decisions that will have an impact on local communities are best made by those communities themselves. Through the devolution agenda, the Government have a very exciting opportunity to devolve not just decision making, but the powers and resources required to deliver those decisions.

I was expressing frustration about the criteria that are sometimes applied to pots of funding. Central Government funding in particular can often be short-term or pit places against one another. Sadly, at times it can be driven by political short-termism, by pork-barrel politics or by who shouts loudest and longest. Under such circumstances, it is hard to plan for the future, and it can be more difficult to be strategic.

From 2020 onwards, the funding allocated to regions from the European Union will come to an end. From 2021, so will the funding allocated through the local growth fund programme. Together, the programmes have totalled billions of pounds of investment. The European funding element in the current programme alone has been worth €207 million for the Sheffield city region, €796 million for Yorkshire and the Humber, €513 million for Northern Ireland, €895 million for Scotland and €2.413 billion for Wales.