Meeting documents

1 THE ISSUE

1.1 The West of England Partnership has agreed a draft Economic Strategy for consultation with stakeholders. This report sets out proposed comments on the Strategy for submission to WEP. A copy of the draft Strategy and Delivery Plan is attached as Appendices 3 and 4.

2 RECOMMENDATION

2.1 Agree the comments set out in this report for submission to the West of England Partnership.

3 FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

3.1 This report does not raise any specific financial implications in its own right. However, implementation of the economic strategy will have serious resource issues. The development of a strategy and framework for prioritisaiton of proposals should enable better planning and management of any resources the Council or other partners commit to this programme.

4 COMMUNITY STRATEGY OUTCOMES

5 CORPORATE IMPROVEMENT PRIORITIES

6 CPA KEY LINES OF ENQUIRY

7 THE REPORT

7.1 The Strategy articulates how the agreed West of England Partnership's (WEP) `Vision' for the area's economy in 2026 is to be delivered. The Strategy offers long term direction for the economic development and regeneration activities of the Unitary Authorities and other partners in the West of England. It is proposed that the strategy will be refreshed at 3 year intervals.

7.2 The Strategy will assist the implementation of the implementation of the Regional Economic Strategy, guide the initiatives of the South West RDA and support the case for regional, national and EU funding bids.

7.3 The range of activity embraced by the Strategy is comprehensive. It reflects the diverse range of issues and challenges, the responsibilities of the partner organisations and their commitment to working jointly towards delivery of the `Vision'. A copy of the Strategy and Delivery Plan is attached as Appendices 3 and 4.

7.4 The draft Strategy has been considered by the WEP Economy & Skills Group. Officers have made initial comments through this process and amendments have been taken on board, particularly in respect of the role, challenges and opportunities facing Bath.

7.5 The WEP Board has agreed the draft strategy for consultation with stakeholders. Comments on the draft have been requested by the end of January in order to enable a revised draft to be considered by the WEP Economy & Skills Group in late February and a final draft to be put before the WEP Board in March. The WEP Office has been advised that submission of Council comments will follow consideration of this report by the Council Executive.

7.6 The draft provides a strategy that broadly accords with the Council's policy framework and enables delivery against corporate priorities. However, there are a number of areas where it is considered the Strategy can be clarified and strengthened. These are highlighted below and in the appendices, together with proposed comments for submission to WEP. Proposed comments are in italics.

7.7 The Strategy is in two parts - the strategy document itself and an accompanying three year delivery plan. It is suggested that ease of use would be assisted by:

o A contents page.

o The format of the strategy and the relationship between the main strategy document and the delivery plan being set out up-front in the first page of the Strategy.

o Reformatting the Delivery Plan to more clearly show the relationship between objectives, actions, outputs and milestones. A suggested format is included as Appendix 1.

7.8 Detailed comments on specific sections of the draft Strategy are set out in Appendix 2.

8 RISK MANAGEMENT

8.1 The report author and Lead Executive member have fully reviewed the risk assessment related to the issue and recommendations, in compliance with the Council's decision making risk management guidance.

9 RATIONALE

9.1 The Council is a partner in the West of England Partnership (WEP) and has been asked to comment prior to agreement of the final Strategy document by WEP. In the interests of the local economy and partnership working, it is important that the Council's views are represented at sub-regional level. The proposed comments are informed by the Council's Economic Strategy, other policy and the Bath and Wider Bath & North East Somerset Business Plans produced by Ernst & Young.

10 OTHER OPTIONS CONSIDERED

10.1 The option of declining to comment has been rejected for the reasons giver under 9.1.

11 CONSULTATION

11.1 The report has been circulated to the Executive Councillor, Other B&NES Services; Section 151 Finance Officer; Chief Executive; Monitoring Officer for comment.

11.2 Stakeholders/Partners have been provided with the opportunity of commenting direct to WEP.

12 ISSUES TO CONSIDER IN REACHING THE DECISION

12.1 Social Inclusion; Sustainability; Equality (age, race, disability, religion/belief, gender, sexual orientation)

13 ADVICE SOUGHT

13.1 The Council's Monitoring Officer (Council Solicitor) and Section 151 Officer (Strategic Director - Support Services) have had the opportunity to input to this report and have cleared it for publication.