Conurbation lecture 2010

Managing the complex

conurbation

The Greater Manchester City-Region

7th December 2010

Structure

1 Introduction : managing the complex conurbation.

2 The urban policy laboratory3 Localities in the recession. 4 Mancunian Mechanisms5 RGF/ LEP = City Regional Policy

under the Coalition.

“Fundamental questions of constitutional structures, centre-region relations, institutional co-ordination, and public expenditure… are addressed as the perhaps unglamorous dimensions of sub-national government and governance.” (Pike and Tomaney 2004)

The Urban Policy Laboratory.

POLICY STRAND 1 Regeneration Policy [Alphabet Soup]

POLICY STRAND 2 The Local Government Modernisation Agenda [turning round the tanker]

POLICY STRAND 3 Performance management measurement, audit and inspection [drowning in documents…]

Joined up government?

POLICY STRAND 1 Regeneration Policy [Alphabet Soup]

• Multiple initiatives • Time scale• Funding • Target regime• Area of benefit• Delivery mechanism / model• Thematic focus• Client group• Governance arrangements• Partnership requirements• “initiativitis”

Regeneration – Governance

1997-2010 4 phases

HO PSA Delivery

PSA 5

PSA 3

PSA 2 (Joint OCJR)

PSA 1

PSA 4

PSA 7

PSA 6

One City Partnership

(LSP)

Notts Police

GOEM (43Staff)

5 Police Forces; 9 DATs;40 CDRPs; 49 Local Auth’s

ProbationPrisonsNASS ASBPolicingPolicy

PolicingStandards

CrimeReduction

Drugs ACDCCU, REU, F

NDCLCJB

9 Area Committees

NOMS

CJS

OCJR CRCSG CommunitiesIND

NottinghamCity Council

Police Authority

Probation Inspectorate

CDRP DATCJIP

Compact

CPS

HMICPrisons

Inspectorate

Individual Regional Offices

Nott BCU

ProbationService

YOT

Courts

REGIONAL

NATIONAL

LOCAL

HMP

Voluntary & Community Sector

POLICY STRAND 2 The LGMA [turning round the tanker]

LGMA shorthand for policy interventions designed to improve (perceived) issues around

Efficiency

Accountability

Decision making Process

Finance

Functions

POLICY STRAND 3 Performance management measurement, audit and inspection [drowning in documents…]

Meanwhile elsewhere in Whitehall…

The Improvement Agenda (close to LGMA but not totally connected)

Empowered the Audit Commission

Waves of improvement

BVPI – Best Value Performance Indicators

CPA – Corporate Performance Assessment

CAA - Comprehensive Area Assessment

The PSA Regime (Public Services Agreements)

Gordon Brown’s Approach – PSA regime

PSA

• Connecting manifesto to delivery mechanisms of Whitehall

• Connecting to “floor targets”

• In some ways odd to have to invent this…

• The “machinery of government” is quite tricky…

PSA match to ministers (2007)Power within the Core Executive I

• Figure 3 Number of PSAs for which each Cabinet Minister is operationally responsible.

• Minister Department Number of PSAs• Ed Balls DCFS 5• Jacqui Smith Home Office 4• John Hutton DBERR 3• Hazel Blears DCLG 2• Peter Hain DWP 2• Alan Johnson DH 2• John Denham DIUS 2• Hilary Benn DEFRA 2• Alistair Darling HMT 1• Jack Straw MoJ 1• Ruth Kelly DfT 1• James Purnell DCMS 1• Ed Miliband Cabinet Office 1• Douglas Alexander DFID 1• David Miliband FCO 1• Harriet Harman Government Equalities Office 1

Underlying logic connecting

• PSA regime

• RIS

• MAAs/EPBs/SCR pilots

• LAA regime

Police

Duty on local councils and other local partners to work together to agree a single set of priorities through a Sustainable Community

Strategy and a Local Area Agreement

Three year delivery plan:Local Area

Agreement (LAA)

Council

Local Neighbourhoods

Local Strategic

Partnership

Long term Sustainable Community

Strategy (SCS)

Service Charter

Service Charter

Health Private sector

Community sector

Local Neighbourhoods

Local Partnership governance architecture

Measuring Success: State of the City

Role of localities in the Recession

Policy

SNR

• Regeneration Framework

• Parkinson report

• CLG / BIS

Central-Local Policy Network

Congested terrain!

Think tanks re: recession

• LGA from recession to recovery: the local dimension

• CLES toward a new wave of local economic activism

• Work Foundation: Recession and Recovery: How UK cities can respond and drive the recovery

Role of cities in a recession

Discuss in pairs/threes for 5 mins…What is the role of a city/locality in the

recession?

None? – let the market do it’s thing?Welfare? role of partners eg. jc+Leadership?Others – want 6 please

Ideopolis - Work Foundation

Barcelona Principles – The Work Foundation

i. Don’t waste the crisis, but respond with leadership and purpose.ii. Make the case for continued public investment and public services and the taxes and other sources of investment required.iii. In the long-term: build local economic strategies which align with long-term drivers and identify future sources of jobs, enterprise, and innovation.iv. In the short-term: focus on retaining productive people, business, incomes, jobs, and investment projects. v. Build the tools and approaches to attract and retain external investment over the long-term.vi. Build genuine long-term relationships with the private sector, trade unions, and other key partners.vii. Take steps to ensure the sustainability and productivity of public works, infrastructure, and major developments/events. viii Local leaders should act purposefully to support their citizens in the face of increased hardship.ix. Local economies have benefitted and should continue to benefit from being open and attractive to international populations and capital.x. Communicate and align with national and other higher tier governments.

Role of localities in the recession : political considerations

LGA ● London is the region most likely to underperform the national

average in a recession, and the South-West the least;

● Major cities outside London such as Newcastle, Leeds and Manchester are likely to do better than the capital.

This research strongly suggests that the most effective way of targeting a response to recession in the places it will make the most difference is to continue with the policies of devolving economic decision-making to which the government has committed itself.

In time of a recession, the need for devolution to sub-regions, including counties, functional economic areas, local council partnerships and individual local authorities becomes more obvious and more urgent.

Brookings/LSE Cities

• New Report

• Comparison of 150 Global Metropolitan Economies

• http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/reports/2010/1130_global_metro_monitor/1130_global_metro_monitor.pdf

Mancunian Mechanisms

Books

• Managing the city: the aims and impacts of urban policy Brian Turnbull Robson 1987

• Managing the cityeds Liddle, Diamond, Southern 2007

• City of Revolution eds Ward and Peck• How Manchester is managed 1925-1939

Stories of “Mancunian ways”

• Mancunian Ways : the politics of regeneration Robson (Chapter 3 City of Revolution)

• Metropolitan Manoeuvres : making greater Manchester Deas and Ward (Chapter City of Revolution)

• Greater Manchester – ‘up and going’, 2000 Hebbert and Deas

• Greater Manchester : conurbation complexity and local government structure Barlow, 1995

• Manchester: Making it Happen Hebbert, 2009

Think tanks: Manchester

• Work Foundation : Ideopolis

• Localis : Can Localism Deliver? Lessons from Manchester

• Policy Exchange : Cities Limited

• NESTA : Original Modern : Manchester’s journey to innovation and growth

City publications

What is Manchester?

• Political• Economic• Statistical• Administrative• Cultural (music and sport)Construction

A Brand?

City / City Regional reification

The manchester case• What are the features of the local governance partnership

architecture in the Greater Manchester city region?• How are existing institutions connected?• What are the connections back to National policy agendas?• What other international models are in play? • Is it unique in the UK? If so in what way? • Are the movers and shakers “the good guys”?

Contention; there is something about manchester ; confidence, autonomy, stability, leadership, assertive bargaining stance with the centre (bombast?) (Robson - Mancunian Ways)

“we use the bits of the SNR which fit our agenda and throw out the bits that don’t”

Features of political landscape in manchester city region

• Helpful in explaining why confident city-regional governance may flourish in Greater Manchester

• Straightforward, horse-trading politics of this…• Traditional Labour authorities (leader of Wigan/AGMA since

1984)• Entrepreneurial authorities (Manchester/Salford)• Lib-Dem oppositional authorities• Role of non-Executive Cllrs• Role of communities/3rd Sector• MPs many with LG background

“we always had better discussions around policy within Labour Group than we do in the PLP…you have to work out how to be effective as an MP whereas in the council your authority is far more direct and tangible”

what have they created?• Using an MAA bidding process (first in

the queue)• Building on AGMA, radically reformed• Incorporating TIF • Linking through to LAA structures• Stretching democratic mandate (!)• Working with business leaders (6/7)

A “Commission” model (QMV, delegated authority comparable to EU commission)

• 7 City Regional Thematic Commissions• Economic one central and fully formed

others immanent (?!)

Compare and contrast with readiness in other MAA areas ?

Organigramme I ; the MAA

Transport Improvement Health Economy Environment

Public

Protection

Housing

& Planning

• Interactions between separate tiers

• MAA self organising autonomous governance network

• LAA statutory output based performance framework

How Manchester is managed, 1935

Regional Planning : The most effective planning scheme is one which is comprehensive in character and not limited by the artificial boundary of a local authority’s area. It’s success depends upon (1) securing an area capable of economic development (2) effective joint action with neighbouring authorities

City regional bodies

City Relationships:Economic linkages in Northern city regions

City Regions and the North

LA boundaries within “the North”

The City Regions of the Northern Way

• 8 City Regions (2004)• Took CRDPs • and transformed into

MAAs

Mersey MAA

Merseyside MAA

Leeds Statutory City Region

‘eternal mobility’ in sub-national

institutional restructuring

Since 1997 policy discourse has “bounced around” scales eg…

• Neighbourhood (renewal)

• Regional (development agencies etc.)

• City Regional

• LOCAL??

The effect is fragmented delivery vehicles in competition

“of course The A of the ABI is not the A of the LAA”

Treating complex networks as complex networks!

• From formal network theory – own terminology!!

• Clique governance is presented as ideal for innovation

• The role of brokers /boundary spanners is very important

• SNA ; ideal type clique governance via brokers

Different types of networks

AGMA

SNA Greater Manchester MAA-LAA (accountabilty)

SNA with local government decentred

Summary : Urban Policy 1997-2010

Urban Policy “Laboratory” fast moving and complex

policy areas dynamic and in tension

Regeneration and economic development

Local Government Modernisation

Performance Management and Measurement

Coalition Urban Policy

Summary : Policy mechanisms 1997-2010

• Underlying logics re: fragmentation and strategic oversight in tension with democratic accountability, political oversight show up in various mechanisms

• PSA regime (National)

• MAA/EPB/SCR (City Regional)

• LAA (Locality plus)

Coalition Localism WP

• Delayed

• Control Shift for planning

• Fundamentally different to what went before

Summary : Recession

• Recession offers new challenges for city and locality leaders

• Barcelona Principles could underpin responses

• As could increased sub-national working

Summary : Manchester

• Manchester Governance is a special case

• Current city regional interest builds on longstanding partnership activity

• Greater Manchester City Region and the roles of Manchester Enterprises, the Commission and AGMA have changed rapidly

• MAA activity underpins LEP