Video transcript: Good Growth for Cities: Delivering Devolution

Transcript

Karen
I'm Karen Finlayson, lead partner for the Good Growth for Cities, and I have some fantastic guests with-, here with me today. So, together, we're going to look at how local leaders can deliver devolution in their areas. I'd like to introduce Kate Josephs, who's the Chief Executive of Sheffield City Council, and Andy Haldane, who's the CEO of the RSA and former Chief Economist at the Bank of England, and finally Rachel Taylor, the leader for government and health industries at PwC, who's passionate about the public and private sector can collaborate together to in-drive inclusive growth across the country.

Welcome.

So, thank you all for joining us today, and, and as we saw in our Good Growth report, that the UK public has turned their focus firmly inwards and their chief concerns this year are around income, jobs, housing and health. The last couple of years has really taken its toll on people, just as has on the nation's economic growth. Some cities have fared better than others but we think the outlook is looking rosier for most, and we believe our new government's commitment to devolution should help, by putting crucial local powers in the hands of local leaders and people.
So, Kate, if I could come to you first, perhaps you could tell us a little bit more about Sheffield and what you're doing to drive economic growth?

Kate
Thanks, Karen. So yeah, for those who don't know Sheffield, and is set out in the PwC report, we're a growing, global, vibrant city. We're the fourth largest city in England, and we have a really particular pride in our green assets, our outdoor assets, as the outdoor city, we've got more green space than many others, in fact the only other city in the world with more green space is Oslo. We also have real strengths in terms of manufacturing and translational research and high knowledge-intensive, highly productive areas in, in some of the spaces where I think the world is going to need answers to very difficult questions. So, we've got some really strong assets to build from as a city, alongside really vibrant creative and cultural life in the city. We also, though, aren't as productive as we need to be. We know that our core cities in the UK collectively could be contributing much more to our-,to our economy, and so the task we all have, both individually and collectively with partners and across our cities, is to identify and focus on the plans for growth locally that will drive prosperity. They’ll drive inclusivity. They'll respond to the challenge of net zero and they will enable us to, to really turn, turn the dial and I think what, you know, I’m looking forward to talking about today is how we’re going about doing that. And really welcome the approach that’s being taken now to a more devolved, I think a more respectful conversation with local government and with mayoral combined authorities who know their place, who know their areas, who know their partners and who want to be in the driving seat in terms of determining the way we drive growth in our place.

Karen
So, Andy, and, you know, there's a plea here from our local leaders around, you know, what central government could perhaps do to help supercharge growth in the UK, and it'd be good to get your perspective on that please?

Andy
Well, I'd echo that plea, lovely to be here, and absolutely, we have a national growth problem, we have a national growth mission to make good on, and for me, the only way we'll make good on that is by making good on a sequence of local growth missions, the like of which Kate is pursuing in Sheffield, and others are right round the UK. How to do that?

Well, for me, the-, you know, the Holy Trinity really are powers, monies and people. You mentioned powers, which is the devolution agenda, good progress on that, truth be told, over the last ten to fifteen years but much, much more needed and much, much more promised. So my hope would be of central government, my ask for them would be, ‘give Kate what she needs to complete the job’, and not just Kate, her like right round the UK, without which, nothing will happen.

Second, monies. Local government funding rules are a total mess, and have been for the better part of 30 years, and need sorting out, without which, with all the powers in the world, can't complete the job. And the third thing, of course, is people, which means people like Kate exhibiting that leadership, again, good
progress but much more needs doing below Kate's level to round out the capacity and capability of local areas, so they can make good on their local growth plan and make good on that national growth mission.

Karen
Rachel, it would be good to get your perspectives. I know you're very informed in what's happening at central government level, so yeah, it would be good to get your perspective as well.

Rachel
So as Andy said, it feels like the powers are really making progress, but again, the money aligned I think the other thing that Kate talked about is, is respectful relationship because actually there's, there's a need to come together. We did some work earlier in the year around rethinking the architecture of government and we brought together local leaders and actually future leaders in the Civil Service to talk a bit about, 'What would make the difference? How could we have a government's infrastructure that is fit for the future?' And what was really pleasing is there was an acknowledgement of actually the need to really, from a Civil Service perspective, to give powers, to give accountability into, into local leaders and also recognition from local leaders, there are some things that are better done centrally and having that conversation I think is really important in order to progress.

Karen
Yeah, that's, that's great, and in terms of the, sort of, the levers you feel you've got available to you as a local leader, Kate, it would be good to understand a little bit more about that, and in particular, is there any information, data, that you use to inform some of those decisions around growth.

Kate
Thank you. I mean, I think one of the levers, that perhaps central government or an over-centralisation of our approach in this country has led to us underestimating, is the huge power of, leadership and involvement on the ground, and I think, you know, Andy’s been very kind about me in my role but actually what’s most powerful about what’s happening in a city like Sheffield at the moment is a genuine sense of a movement. A team involving private sector, voluntary and community sector, communities themselves, the city, the public sector, the big anchor institutions, like the universities, coming together and seeing the mission as something that they have both agency in and real knowledge and depth of knowledge about.

So, for, the first lever I'd say that is important is-, and it is a-, it's a form of data, it's qualitative data but it's respect for the, kind of, understanding of place, which needs to be at the heart of this. And linked to that then, I think you can also then leverage the assets that all of the different parts of a-, of a place have. You can start to pull those capabilities together in a place. We've moved well beyond that very, sort of, linear model of delivery. We're much more now into a space of understanding that what we're talking about are systems and ecosystems, and to make systems and ecosystems work, you need capability, you need relationships and you need a clear sense of mission and focus. I'd absolutely endorse the points raised about surety of and fairness of funding and a recognition that, at present, in-, certainly for local authorities, the work around economic growth-, knowledge-intensive jobs and productivity but we're also talking about connecting our communities with that growth. I think there's a really interesting challenge coming out of the system on, 'How do we balance the statutory requirements on local authorities with work on growth and, and prosperity?' Which is currently not a statutory requirement but I think there's quite a strong case to recognise this as a core part of our role.

Karen
We've been talking about devolution for quite a long time now, and so it'd be a-, good to understand, from your-, each of you, some of the barriers that you think we need to overcome to accelerate this agenda forward.

Kate
When we talk about devolving power and devolving to local areas, to regions, to, to the regional mayors, we have to think about, 'What does that mean?' And I think it has to mean much more ability for those places to define the question that is being asked and to define the work that's going to be needed. And at the moment, that's really hard in local places and a lot of what we spend our time and, frankly, waste resources doing is matching up and marrying what we know we need to do or the question we want to ask locally with myriad pots of funding and requirements, to try and get that to match up to where, you know-, and so, so I think that is a really important thing to look at.

Andy
What we'll need for the devolution of powers to be sustained and for people like Kate to be given the incentives to innovate and take risks, calculated risks, Kate, but risks nonetheless, to do stuff differently. 'Cause one thing we can say, with 100 % probability, is if all Kate does is the same stuff as in the past, she'll get the same outcomes as in the past, which is the opposite of what all of us want.

Karen
It'd be good to get your perspective, in terms of, sort of, the productivity challenge that we, the UK, have got and, sort of, the economic view on that and some of the-, again, what do you think central government should be doing to, to unlock some of that productivity?

Rachel
Often the narrative in the media, in, in some of the discussion and, and think tanks is all about, 'Actually, this is about a postcode lottery,' whereas actually, we do want-, if we want places to be responsive to the people and the, the challenges and the opportunities in a place, there will be difference between regions. And I think acknowledging that, I think, is incredibly important.

Kate
Of course, you know, we already have a postcode lottery,' and in Sheffield, it's very, very stark. There are neighbourhoods in Sheffield where the healthy life expectancy of the people born in that neighbourhood are fifteen years less than people less than two miles away. There is a postcode lottery in our country. It's called deep and entrenched inequality. It's also completely unacceptable and unfair, and I know that it's what-, certainly what motivates me and many, many others. It's about creating growth, so there are better jobs.

Andy
I'll give you an example, topical example actually, 'cause a few weeks ago, just next door to where Kate is, in Barnsley, the Pathways to Work initiative was launched. That was about getting inactive people, people not in jobs or in training, back, back into work, and there are 9 million people across the UK in that position. You could not think of a bigger kicker to productivity and growth than getting more of those people into the workforce but you need some wraparound programme.

It's about health but it's also about skills and about benefits and about pensions and about business. Without a joined-up plan straddling all of those features, you have no hope of getting any of those 9 million back into work.

Kate
I think the Pathways to Work work is just a really great example of what-, of the potential of, of devolution. Really strongly evidence-based approach to understanding, at a very granular level, what is it that gets in the way of people who are economically inactive getting into work? Which we know has huge impacts on, on-, not just on productivity and the macro stuff, but on their health, on their wellbeing, on their sense of self, on their sense of pride, all those things that matter, and, and we-, we've got that level of granularity in Barnsley, and we're now able to take that model and think about, 'Well, how might that work in the rest of the region?

And if we map these plans to central government departments, we could end up having, you know, twenty different conversations, whereas actually, in a place, you can have a few conversations but but you can join those different things up, and I think that, for me, is the-, is the real power of, of this work. And when we look at the index that PwC have produced and, and look over time at what's been happening in our cities, something has got to change, and this feels like the move that needs to happen.

Rachel
There's something, looking at the public priorities this year, as you say, Kate, around income, jobs, health. Actually, I think what you're talking about there and Pathways to Work aligns very clearly with what the public priorities are and what we feel the public is looking for for good growth to exist, so really good alignment, I think.

Karen
We hope you enjoyed the conversation. So, to look at all the data around individual city performance and the wider view of what the public is prioritising right now, please view our Good Growth for Cities report now.