Delays stall receipt of growth fund cash

An accountant closely involved in the process of assessing the legal and financial viability of first-round Regional Growth Fund (RGF) bids has made some suggestions as to why the process is taking so long. As Regeneration & Renewal's sister magazine, Planning, revealed on Friday, the Government has completed due diligence on just one of the 45 provisionally successful bids announced in April - despite a pledge to review all first-round RGF bids by the autumn.

Shadow business secretary Gordon Marsden had some strong words of criticism against the coalition government when the news broke. He said: "It is extraordinary that after four months, the government has only given the green light to one approved bid. The RGF is supposed to be the jewel in the crown of the coalition's regional policy, yet it looks as though officials have been sleeping at the wheel."

Certainly, during conversations with R&R over the past few months, members of the government's RGF advisory panel, including Sir Ian Wrigglesworth, have been keen to stress how important it is that the RGF funding reaches the recipients as quickly as possible, to help mitigate the impact of far-reaching public sector spending cuts. After all, the RGF is intended to support those areas that have become too economically dependent on the public sector. So why the delay? And how likely is it that due diligence for the remaining 44 bids will be completed before the end of the year?

Neville Bearpark, corporate finance partner at UNW, which is advising on due diligence for three of the first-round bids at the moment, said the process is highly complex and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills' response last week - that it still intends to review all bids by the autumn - is "extremely optimistic". He gave the following reasons - all of which paint a rather chaotic picture of what is going on at BIS in terms of administering the RGF:

1) "The RGF is a new scheme, requiring a new assessment process for bids, and the exact requirements for due diligence are only just coming to light [from BIS]."

2) "There is only a relatively small team at BIS dedicated to the RGF, and they have a big workload."

3) "Thirdly - and most crucially - the due diligence process has not really started for many of the [45] bids because the applicants are still finalising the terms of their funding offer letters from BIS. Offer letters from the department have to be formally accepted by applicants before they can begin the due diligence process. But the parameters of a particular project - not the project itself, but things like other sources of funding, details about delivery partners and timescales, for example - might have altered slightly in the months since the initial bid was submitted. BIS must be made aware of these changes so it can include the revised details in its offer letter, resend this to the applicants, and wait for them to come back to BIS and accept. It is a very complex and long-winded process that is going on behind the scenes."

This is all fascinating stuff - I for one wasn't aware of the complexities of the offer letter procedure and how this could be delaying the process. It remains to be seen, then, when the funding, for both first and second round bids, is released.

sarah.townsend@haymarket.com

After the riots: 10 ways in which the Government has responded to the disorder

“This must be a wake-up call for our country,” said Prime Minister David Cameron earlier this week, in a speech in which he outlined a set of responses to the rioting and looting which swept English cities last week. “Social problems that have been festering for decades have exploded in our face.”

The Prime Minister’s speech, delivered at a youth club in his Oxfordshire constituency and available in full here, contained a number of measures unveiled in response to the disorder which caused mayhem in some English cities. Deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, home secretary Theresa May, communities secretary Eric Pickles and work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith have also made their own policy announcements.

Read on for our summary of ten policy measures announced by the coalition in response to the riots:

1. Financial assistance for riot-hit premises and areas

Communities secretary Eric Pickles has announced a clutch of funding measures intended to get businesses trading again in areas affected by the riots. Last week, he unveiled a £20 million pot intended to finance measures that "will get businesses trading again and meet short-term costs" and a £10 million “recovery fund" to help councils with the immediate costs of making their areas "safe, clear and clean again". This week, Pickles also awarded £20 million of funding for improvements to two riot-hit parts of London - Croydon and Tottenham.

2. Planning shake-up mooted

Following a pledge from the Prime Minister to ‘weed out’ unnecessary planning rules following the riots, chief planner Steve Quartermain wrote to councils to urge them to help firms affected by the disorder to bring premises back into use as quickly as possible by prioritising the processing of planning applications.

Quartermain asked councils to treat applications for shutters as a priority, while the Department for Communities and Local Government said it would use the planned consultation on permitted development to consider whether shutters and other security measures should be permitted development.

3. Riot payback scheme outlined

Deputy prime minister Nick Clegg said earlier this week that a "riot payback" scheme would see rioters and looters "make up for the damage done" and "face their victims". At a press conference, he said: "I can announce today as well that in every single one of the communities effected there will be Community Payback schemes, Riot Payback schemes where you will see people in visible orange clothing making up for the damage done, repairing and improving the neighbourhoods effected." However, it is unclear how the scheme outlined by Clegg differs from the existing Community Payback scheme that offenders can be required to undertake.

4. Pledge to turn around 120,000 'troubled' families

In his speech on Monday, David Cameron said: "The broken society is back at the top of my political agenda … I have an ambition, before the end of this parliament, we will turn around the lives of 120,000 most troubled families … we need more urgent action on the families that some people call 'problem', others call 'troubled'. The ones everyone in their neighbourhood knows and often avoids." The drive to tackle the 120,000 "most troubled families" was first announced by the coalition in December 2010, but in his speech, Cameron pledged to put "rocket boosters" under attempts to help this group. It has been reported that the Government's community budgets programme - a key plank of its drive to help troubled families turn their lives around - has been held back by a lack of ambition on the part of the ministers involved and a lack of strong leadership.

5. Benefits sanctions mooted for rioters and evictions supported

Several London authorities have said they will seek to evict from council-owned homes people who are convicted of involvement in rioting. Last week, the London Borough of Wandsworth served a tenant with an eviction notice after that person's son appeared in court in connection with the Clapham Junction riot. The Prime Minister and communities secretary Eric Pickles have both said they thought plans to evict rioters from social housing were a good idea. But the eviction notice served by Wandsworth has proved controversial - a petition opposing the move has already attracted nearly 2,000 signatures.

Work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith, meanwhile, has said that people convicted but not jailed for rioting could be stripped of their benefits.

6. All out war on gangs declared

In his speech on Monday, the Prime Minister declared a "concerted, all-out war on gangs and gang culture". "This isn’t some side issue," Cameron said. "It is a major criminal disease that has infected streets and estates across our country." The Prime Minister added: "Stamping out these gangs is a new national priority. Last week I set up a cross-government programme to look at every aspect of this problem. We will fight back against gangs, crime and the thugs who make people’s lives hell and we will fight back hard."

7. 'Family test' promised for domestic policies

A "family test" will be applied to all domestic policies to ensure they did not undermine or "stop families from being together", according to the Prime Minister. “I want a family test applied to all domestic policy,” Cameron said in his speech on Monday. “If it hurts families, if it undermines commitment, if it tramples over the values that keeps people together, or stops families from being together, then we shouldn’t do it.”

8. Independent panel to investigate riots

The coalition Government is to establish an independent panel to give victims of the riots a chance to "have their voice heard", deputy prime minister Nick Clegg said earlier this week. Clegg said that the communities and victims panel, which is to be chaired by an independent figure, would produce a report within six to nine months to be presented to the leaders of all three main political parties. Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, had pledged that if the Government did not launch a public inquiry into the riots and looting, then his own party would conduct one.

9. New curfew powers considered

Home secretary Theresa May has said it was necessary to look at giving the police the power to impose immediate curfews covering wide geographical areas in order to tackle the kind of fast-moving disturbances that swept across many of England's major cities last week. May is also keen to extend existing limited powers to impose curfews on individual teenagers aged under 16. But human rights groups have expressed alarm at the proposals, warning that a lack of police powers was not the problem in last week's urban riots.

10. National citizen service to be made 'rite of passage'

The Prime Minister said in his speech earlier this week that his flagship National Citizen Service scheme would be made available to all 16-year-olds ‘as a rite of passage’. The coalition Government’s intention has always been, over time, to offer the National Citizen Service programme to all 600,000 16-year-olds, but Cameron said in his speech that he would “put renewed effort into making it happen”. “This should become a great national effort,” he said.

Under the Government’s plans, the NCS will last seven to eight weeks over the summer months, including at least ten days and nights on a residential basis. But the initiative was heavily criticised earlier this year by the education select committee, which said that it could not support the programme in its current form as its costs may exceed the entirety of public spending on youth services.

Reacting to the riots

The unrest seen in towns and cities across England has sparked widespread condemnation. But there has also been much soul-searching as society tries to understand how the factors behind the events of recent days.

For years the regeneration sector has worked in some of the communities affected. Some are now questioning not only the effectiveness of this work but the methods themselves.

Regeneration & Renewal spoke to some of those working in the field in an attempt to find out what the riots mean for regeneration.

Jess Steele, director of innovation at social action network Locality:

“Having been working in regeneration for 25 years it’s really quite simple that we’ve never got it right so far,” she said. “Regeneration has been done to communities rather than by them. That creates a sense of powerlessness, even if things are technically improving.

“The future of regeneration policy has to be about listening. We’re not talking about big inward investment programmes. We’re talking about helping people in poor areas create their own small scale enterprises.”

Jackie Sadek, chief executive at Regeneration UK:

“I’ve been banging on for years now that we have got to get cleverer with our regeneration programmes, it’s not just about the built environment, it’s about the people in the communities, they are at the heart of regeneration,” she said.

But she also warned against taking reactionary measures. “Over the last 30 years we have gained huge experience of what works and, more importantly, what doesn't, in urban regeneration. There should be no kneejerk reaction.”

Sir Peter Hall, Bartlett professor of planning and regeneration at University College London:

“Tottenham is among the most deeply deprived areas in London. It has estates that have suffered more and more problems as they have received more and more residents with social problems. It has led to a concentration of anti-establishment types and the creation of a sub culture that sees itself in some kind of heroic gang battle against the police.

“We have lulled ourselves into a false belief that this is a very happy city. When the Paris riots happened, we said they couldn’t happen here. There is clearly a proportion of the population that is very alienated indeed, with no attachment to wider society at all

“In Ealing the rioters were marauding through the streets because they couldn’t get into the enclosed shopping mall. High streets are vulnerable, I’m afraid”.

Tony Burton, director at Civic Voice:

“There’s no doubt that from our point of view that we need to reflect on the question of what can be done. I suspect we’ll find it’s very complex and there’s no single answer,” he said.

He also stressed that there was more to the riots than bad news stories. “It’s important that we also look at the positive reactions in the face of the negativity,” he said. “You will see other responses from people who love their areas and feel very personally about the effects of what was happened.”

Martin Blackwell, chief executive at the Association of Town Centre Management:

“Within a relatively short space of time the physical things can be redressed but it’s the reputational things that are important. In terms of making town centres a destination of choice this has done enormous damage in London therefore the town centre management network and its role as broker between businesses, the police and local communities will be crucially important.”

The Association of Convenience Stores:

“Experience from Northern Ireland suggests that retail areas can take a long time to recover from rioting. In some cases retailers decide not to re-open.”

Gavin Poole, executive director at the Centre for Social Justice:

“These are the actions of people who live in chaos, hopelessness and poverty. What they are doing is criminal, completely wrong and must be punished,” he said. “But it is not entirely random; they believe they have nothing to lose and no one to answer to. Some even consider it normal.”

“Yes, we need political leadership and a debate about policing techniques. But when the violence ends, we need deep rooted social reform which understands that a section of Britain is badly broken and needs to be rebuilt.”

Matt Thomson, head of policy and practice, Royal Town Planning Institute:

“People are always going to question if there is something about [the urban] environment that has been a factor. The question is whether we want to plan around the small risk of some sort of urban unrest.

"One way of reacting would be to put steel shutters on shops and gated areas on high streets. Would that be appropriate, or would it add to a feeling of oppression? We want to avoid kneejerk reactions. We have got to get to the bottom of why these things happened before jumping to conclusions.”

Joe Montgomery, chief executive for Europe at membership organisation the Urban Land Institute, and former director general for neighbourhood renewal at the Department for Communities and Local Government:

“Previous regeneration initiatives in places like Tottenham may have delivered results at the time, and in a few years that followed, but needs have to be considered afresh, as a new generation of people finds themselves on the margins of the economy.

“Bricks and mortar aspects of development are crucial to creating strong and prosperous communities. But people-focussed interventions are crucial too. Without well-functioning community safety, training, employment, enterprise and inward investment programmes, some of these neighbourhoods may not make the progress that they could.

“We have learned that it is vital to have first class communications in place that dispel myths that would otherwise ramp up tension. Communication with community networks needs to be skilfully managed to make communities feel safe and restore law and order.

“Communities like Tottenham and Croydon are resilient, and will want a resumption of normal life as soon as possible. At the moment, the priority is the restoration of calm, while working out how to continue to make the inner city an attractive place to invest”.

More reaction will be added as it comes in.

Report questions wisdom of Manchester Airport enterprise zone

A report has been published today claiming that the Government made the wrong decision in locating Greater Manchester's enterprise zone at Manchester Airport.

The report, which was commissioned by lobby group the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and undertaken by the Metropolitan Transport Research Unit, is based on an analysis of outline development proposals for the Airport City enterprise zone on which the city council is currently consulting. (The proposals themselves have been put forward by Mag Developments, the development arm of the Manchester Airport company.)

The report claims that the consultation document contains little concrete evidence to support the case for an enterprise zone at the airport rather than somewhere else in the city-region. A few of its key criticisms are listed below:

- "The idea [a key plank of the proposals] of attracting internationally mobile companies into the enterprise zone which would otherwise locate elsewhere in Europe is not supported by any specific evidence in the consultation document."

- "The enterprise zone location is within current green belt, and there are some environmental issues on sites currently proposed immediately north of the airport which haven't been fully investigated."

- "The airport enterprise zone is likely to displace jobs and economic activity from areas outside of the zone that are also in need of investment."

- "Many crucial details [about the development site], such as much of the land area, the planned mix of uses and proposed conditions such as parking, are not available."

- "The benefits to urban regeneration of Wythenshawe [the deprived area of Greater Manchester in which the airport sits] do not depend in any major way on the proximity of the airport and associated developments, but rather on the efficacy of a wide range of other measures, particularly social mobility and training. In fact it is far from clear that the proximity of ‘Airport City’ will be more effective in urban regeneration than development at other locations within commuting distance have been."

It's not necessarily surprising that the chosen location of an enterprise zone has been challenged - the local papers are full of reports of various councillors and/or business leaders/members of the public expressing disappointment that their preferred site missed out, because everyone wants their own area to benefit from the perks an enterprise zone could offer.

However, this report made me think of comments put to me by sources while I was researching another enterprise zone-related story recently. At least two planners I spoke to, who wished to remain anonymous, raised concerns that the quality of enterprise zone plans put forward by the first four 'vanguard' zones at the beginning of this year - of which Manchester Airport is one - is likely to be lower than those of the other first and second-wave zones.

This is simply because, the sources argued, the first four were chosen by Government some time before ministers consolidated the policy on enterprise zones, published guidance for those bidding for a zone and started sending out officials to advise LEPs on their plans. The sources suggested that the vanguards were therefore at a disadvantage having been selected straight away by the Government and then having to go about finalising plans, rather than having to submit detailed plans as part of a competitive bidding process.

This is an interesting observation, and one that might explain why I have been chasing each of the four vanguards for almost three months now to find out concrete details about the incentives they hope to use and how they want their zone to work, but as yet in vain!

Regional growth indicators: do they need an overhaul?

When business minister Mark Prisk told Regeneration & Renewal's Northern Summit last October that Labour's regional development agencies (RDAs) had failed to close the north-south divide, what he failed to observe is that they had probably played a part in preventing the economic gap from widening.

Prisk told delegates: "The economic divide between the Greater South-East and the rest of England is as wide today as when the RDAs were established, despite having spent £19 billion of public money.

"Between 1990 and 1999 – the year the RDAs were set up - Gross Value Added (GVA) growth averaged 2.5 per cent a year in the Greater South-East, and 1.9 per cent in the remaining English regions - a gap of 0.6 percentage points.

"Between 1999 and 2008, under the RDAs, annual GVA averaged 2.1 per cent in the Greater South-East, and 1.5 per cent in the rest of the country - also a gap of 0.6 percentage points.

"That, by any measure, is a failed policy."

We don't know for sure what the situation would have been like had the RDAs not existed - just as we have no idea really what impact the coalition's abolition of the RDAs and introduction of a smaller-than-regional approach to economic development is going to have on different parts of the country. As yet, we can only speculate.

What is crucial is that, in order to properly evaluate this in the coming years, it would be useful if the Government retained the same - or similar - data set that has been used for much of the past decade to assess the economic state of the regions.

But the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Bis) is consultating, until the end of August, on the future of the so-called Regional Economic Performance Indicators (REPIs) - which gather statistics on indicators such as average property prices, numbers claiming benefits, job creation and deprivation levels, across the regions.

Although a Bis spokeswoman told me this week that the statistics would continue to be collected annually, she also said that, when the latest stats were published [in May], the department launched the consultation because "we want to make sure the data being collected remains relevant to the shift in policy".

The consultation itself says: "Given the recent large changes in government policy in some areas, in particular a shift from regionalism to localism, it is important that Bis ensures that the [REPIs] publication continues to provide the range of sub-national statistics which are relevant to users."

And one of the consultation questions asks: "To what extent would your work/business be disrupted if the statistics that you use were discontinued?" - which suggests that the Government might consider doing that.

It will be interesting to see the consultation responses. If, for whatever reason, local government, regeneration practitioners, policy experts and others no longer think that the current indicators are the best way of measuring growth now that we have a different economic geography, then fair enough - change can only be a good thing. But any revised data set must ensure that it is still possible to judge the success or otherwise of localism versus regionalism.

Click here for details of the consultation.

Picture credited to David Chadwick

Enterprise zone bids 'overestimate job creation'

New research reveals that the bulk of proposed enterprise zones are expected to create a total of 75,000 jobs by April 2015, but challenges the bidders' estimates at the same time.

Regeneration & Renewal's sister magazine, Planning, reports today on some of the key findings of the first independent analysis of enterprise zone bids submitted to ministers. Consultancy SQW's research, which is based on analysis of 19 of the 29 second-round bids and one first-round bid, reveals that more than half of proposed zones cover more than one site. This is despite the Government indicating that its preference is for single-site zones.

While this is the focus of the Planning article, there are a couple of other interesting findings that emerged from the research and that are worth writing about separately.

- The first is on job creation. Although SQW only obtained data on employment expectations from 16 enterprise zone proposals, it found that these 16 expect to create around 75,000 jobs in total. This averages about 4,700 jobs per zone, with the range stretching from 700 and 12,420 jobs per zone, according to the data.

Most of these jobs are expected to be "additional", SQW says, meaning that they won't be jobs displaced from nearby areas or 'deadweight' ones that would have been created anyway. In fact, more than a quarter of the 16 bids stated that they expected zero displacement of jobs from outside the zone.

However, as SQW points out, "since the high level of displacement was one of the key criticisms of the original 1980s enterprise zones, the expectation is questionable".

SQW also considers the timescale within which these jobs are expected to be created "very optimistic". The report says: "The question on the application form was specifically about jobs to be created by April 2015 - less than four years from now. Although individual circumstances vary, there will - in many cases - be a significant 'lead-in' time: local development order (LDO) powers are not finalised, some sites require infrastructure investment and [in many cases] the building process itself needs to proceed."

It continues: "Our view is that the lead time for jobs to be created will be significant in terms of supply side issues. There is also the question of demand: inward investment and business support strategies feature prominently, but how long will these take to bear fruit, and at what scale?"

This is a valid point - the coalition has warned that it will favour 'ready sites' that don't require too much extra construction work, but looking at the bids that R&R has reported on over the past few weeks, it's clear that many will require a significant amount of work before jobs are created.

- The second point worth mentioning is around business rate retention. SQW's analysis of the bids found that few LEPs were clear about how they wanted to use this revenue stream - "mostly the inference was that plans for this will be "sorted later", the research says. SQW points out that "the question of how the value of an uplift in business rates from the enterprise zone will be distributed across the wider LEP geography could raise some interesting challenges".

Some LEPS, however, suggested that uses for retained business rates could include the creation of evergreen investment funds, site-specific infrastructure investments and small-scale inward investment and/or business support services.

Chris Green, chief executive of SQW raises a crucial point when he says: "A key issue is whether a two-tier LEP landscape will eventually emerge: 21 LEPs with enterprise zones have the prospect of a long-term reveue stream, albeit one which will not kick in immediately.

"Will the remaining 15 LEPs be left without comparable resources?"

From ceramics to railways: emerging second-round RGF bids

Details of bids submitted to the second round of the £1.4 billion Regional Growth Fund (RGF) are slowly starting to trickle out.

A spokeswoman for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) told me earlier this month that the department would make an announcement about the total number of bids received - broken down per region as officials did for the RGF's first funding round - "within the next couple of weeks". I'm still waiting. In the meantime, I've compiled a selection of the bids that have emerged so far...

(Note that the second round of the RGF allows applicants to bid for 'programme' funding for third party funding bodies to administer grants and loans to small businesses, for example, as well as 'project' funding for one-off schemes.)

Leeds City Region LEP: has submitted a bid for £15 million of RGF funding to support "programmes and projects that will leverage up to £78 million of additional investment", a LEP spokesman said, but he did not specify what these projects were. The LEP also backed a further 29 bids to support major infrastructure projects in the region, including a project to invest in Bradford City Centre. It also backed 17 other company-led bids to help develop advanced manufacturing firms in the area.

Stoke-on-Trent & Staffordshire LEP: has backed ten business-led bids from the region, but would not say how much they are for. The bids are for the following projects: ISE Estate Ltd at Beacon Business Park, which wants funding for roads and related infrastructure that will open up 4.5 acres of employment land; Steerlite International, to develop a new manufacturing facility to produce bone china in the UK; North Staffordshire Chamber of Commerce, for a project that aims to attract private investment offering new gross-value-added local jobs; CERAM, a programme that would help develop the processing capabilities of the UK ceramics industry; Moorland and City Railways, for a project to acquire a series of disused railway lines in North Staffordshire which will be renovated and re-opened to create the UK's largest sustainable private railway network; REALIS, a scheme that aims to reposition Stoke-on-Trent and North Staffordshire as a key destination for businesses, developers, shoppers and tourists; Dunston Business Village, a scheme that works to convert former agricultural buildings into business units; Etruria Valley, a site that has been earmarked for development into a business park and which has been forward as the areas's enterprise zone; Zytek Ltd, for a project that would create a facility for the research, development, training and manufacture of advanced motor and control technologies, and Rapiscan, for a scheme to establish a high technology factory in Biddulph.

The LEP has also supported bids to support four regional funding programmes: Business Growth 360, Accessible Finance Ltd, West Midlands Kick Start Partnership and the Coventry and Warwickshire Co-operative Development Agency.

Sheffield City Region LEP: has supported eight bids from around the region. These are for: Finance Yorkshire, which seeks to provide access to finance for small and medium sized firms in the area and is seeking an £8.5 million contribution from the RGF to an overall £17 million fund; Visions of China, a culture-led development at Rother Valley Country Park that is seeking £5.7 million of RGF funding; Chesterfield Waterside, a regeneration project at Chester, which wants £1.1 million to bring forward the first phase of office development in Basin Square; Markham Vale, a business park that wants £1.1 million to deliver the second phase of development and become the city-region's enterprise zone if approved by Government; the Advanced Manufacturing Growth Hub, which wants £3.3 million towards a £27 million scheme to create a new business hub on the Advanced Manufacturing Park at Waverley; the Barnsley Dearne scheme, which wants £4 million for a series of retail and construction projects to develop the town of Goldthorpe and the village of Thurnscoe; the Employment Growth Programme, which provides funding for local SMEs, and the Tech Accelerator Programme, which provides funding for start-ups with high growth potential.

Tees Valley Unlimited LEP: has endorsed bids from the region worth a total of £156 million. Of these, 26 are submissions from companies to grow their business, with a total RGF ask of £79.4 million. The LEP did not disclose details of the individual projects and programmes that have been supported, but said that they were from industries including logistics and distribution, low carbon, manufacturing and the digital and creative sector.

North Somerset Council: has submitted a bid for £43 million to reopen the Portishead to Bristol railway line. A further £4.8 million needed for the project would be met from council resources and planning agreement money earmarked from developments in Portishead, according to the local press.

And car manufacturer Lotus has bid for £10 million to build a new production factory in Norfolk for its new models, according to the Financial Times.

Image by Renee V

Enterprise Zone Watch #3

Tomorrow's deadline for submitting enterprise zone bids is almost upon us, so this will be the final installment of Enterprise Zone Watch.

Over the past week, there's been a flurry of bidding activity from LEPs hoping to get one of 10 second-wave enterprise zones, while those LEPs that were selected to have one of the 11 first-wave enterprise zones have also been busy finalising their proposals for where they'd like their zone to be located.

The Government is expected to announce the successful zones by the end of July, and which LEPs stand the strongest chance of getting one is, so far, anybody's guess. There's been a huge variety of bids: one LEP - Tees Valley Unlimited - has included 24 sites in their proposals for a zone - while the Sheffield City Region LEP wants four sites to be included in one zone and others are focussing on just one.

In the meantime, look out for my story in this Friday's issue of Planning magazine, which gives a further update on the types of zones LEPs are bidding for.

- East Sussex, Essex, Kent, Medway, Southend and Thurrock (ESEKMST) LEP has put forward two possible sites for an enterprise zone. Its first preference site is the Discovery Park in Sandwich, Kent, an existing business park with a focus on pharmaceutical, cleantech and research and development businesses. The second preference site is Enterprise West Essex at Harlow, a mixed-use development site that includes the former home of telecoms firm Nortel.

- South East Midlands LEP has selected Northampton Waterside for an enterprise zone. The site, situarted alongside the River Nene, is expected to create 14,000 new jobs and hundreds of new businesses in the town, the LEP says, and it would focus on high performance engineering.

- The Humber LEP wants its zone to cover three separate sites south of the River Humber: Green Port Hull and Alexandra Dock; Queen Elizabeth Dock; and Able Marine Energy Park site in North Lincolnshire. The zone would focus on attracting top-tier manufacturing firms in the renewable energy industry.

- Oxfordshire LEP wants the county's Science Vale to become a zone. The area includes the Milton Park Business Park and the Harwell science campus. The zone would focus on boosting the high tech business clusters in the local area, according to press reports.

- Greater Cambridgeshire and Greater Peterborough LEP are submitting a bid for Alconbury Airfield to become an enterprise zone, according to reports. The LEP wants part of the disused airfield to become a business park and the zone would reportedly cover 150ha of the 575ha site.

- Tees Valley LEP (Tees Valley Unlimited) has submitted proposals for a bumper zone spanning 24 different sites across the Tees Valley, including at Middlesbrough, Stockton, Redcar and Cleveland and Billingham. See our story here for the full list of sites.

- The Coast to Capital LEP, meanwhile, has dropped two out of three sites that it initially put forward for an enterprise zone, after the Government instructed it to choose just one. Its revised bid now includes plans for a zone in Bognor Regis, including sites at Oldlands Farm, the Salt Box and the former LEC airfield with potential for 7,500 new jobs.

The Government's recommendation to the Coast to Capital LEP is somewhat confusing given that communities secretary Eric Pickles reportedly hailed the Tees Valley's bid for multiple sites to become a zone as "brave and exciting".

- The Leeds City Region LEP has selected Aire Valley for an enterprise zone.

The coalition's U-turns on regeneration

The last two weeks have seen the coalition Government carry out a series of screeching U-turns. This week’s policy reversal on prison sentences followed last week’s backtracking on controversial NHS reforms and communities secretary Eric Pickles’ announcement that he was binning a pledge to reinstate weekly rubbish collections from homes. But it’s not just in the high-profile policy areas of justice, health and bin collections that the coalition Government has abruptly changed direction. Here are some regeneration-related U-turns implemented since last year’s election.

‘Shadow’ mayors

The coalition Government’s policy on directly elected mayors – in particular on whether mayors should be installed before or after referendums take place – has been beset by a series of U-turns. At last year’s Conservative Party conference, local government minister Bob Neill said that the public would not be given the opportunity to vote on whether they want elected mayors in the 12 largest cities outside London until after the mayors have been installed. But, later in the same month, communities secretary Eric Pickles said that it was “completely out of the question” that mayors could be installed before allowing members of the public to vote on whether they want them.

However, in December 2010, the Localism Bill revealed that the council leaders in the 12 English cities would become “shadow mayors” before referendums are held in those cities to decide whether they will be run by directly elected mayors. Now, in a fresh twist, government amendments to the Localism Bill, tabled earlier this week, would scrap plans to create shadow mayors in the 12 cities.

LEP funding

The funding arrangements (or lack of them) for the council and business-led local enterprise partnerships that are replacing the regional development agencies have long been a thorny issue for the coalition. In July last year, the coalition Government withdrew a stipulation that the LEPs would have to fund their own day-to-day running costs (this stipulation had appeared in a version of a letter from ministers that was subsequently withdrawn). Later in 2010, the local growth white paper revealed that LEPs would – as was widely expected – have to fund their own day-to-day running costs.

But earlier this year, the Government backtracked on its refusal to provide central funding for LEPs’ day-to-day running costs. A £5 million fund, announced last month, can be spent by LEPs on training, staff salaries, business engagement and office rent and equipment.

RDA abolition

Labour’s flagship RDAs are being replaced by LEPs, with the winding up process due to be completed by March 2012. But it did not always look certain that all of the RDAs would be abolished. In June last year, business secretary Vince Cable said that the RDAs in the North of England would “continue in pretty much the way the did before” under the new coalition government. And in the same week, during his first Commons question time as Prime Minister, David Cameron said: "On RDAs, what we have said is that in areas of the country where they work well and where local authorities want to keep them as they are, they can."

Community infrastructure levy

In opposition, the Conservative Party promised to abolish the community infrastructure levy (CIL) - a tax on development that is intended to raise funds for infrastructure such as schools, hospitals and transport links. The party's Open Source Planning paper, published at the beginning of 2010, had said that the levy was "unnecessarily complicated" and said that, if elected, the Tories would instead introduce a "single unified tariff". But in November 2010, decentralisation minister Greg Clark surprised the sector by announcing that the levy would be retained, albeit with reforms to ensure funds from the tariff are passed directly to local neighbourhoods.

Enterprise Zone Watch #2

The second installment of Regeneration & Renewal's 'EZ Watch' contains more news of council and business-led local enterprise partnerships' plans for enterprise zones within their boundaries.

LEPs have until the end of this month to submit bids to Government. Excluding the four 'vanguard' zones that were confirmed by George Osborne in the Budget, sites in just 17 LEP areas will be designated zones once the Government completes its assessment process at the end of the summer.
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Enterprise Zone Watch #1

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Here is a summary of the latest plans:

- Coventry and Warwickshire LEP has earmarked a planned development site between Coventry Airport and the Tollbar A45 junction. This is land intended for development as part of a major expansion of the airport. The LEP estimates the zone could create up to 10,000 new jobs

- Marches LEP is submitting a bid for an enterprise zone at Rotherwas Park, a 16.2ha site earmarked for development of a private sector business park focused on advanced engineering and the growing cluster of defense-related businesses in the area.

- West of England LEP has chosen Bristol's Temple Quay area, a 29.5ha site to the north and east of Bristol’s Temple Meads rail station. Bristol is one of the seven LEP areas that the coalition said earlier this year would definitely have a zone, but the LEP is awaiting ministerial approval of its selection. The zone is intended to focus on attracting creative and hi-tech businesses.

- The Black Country LEP is working on a bid for a zone that is split among five sites in each of the four local authorities partners in the LEP: Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton. One of these would be the Waterfront office complex near Merry Hil, which has a high proportion of empty office space, according to a report in the local press.

- Solent LEP is putting together a bid for a site at the Daedalus Airfield in Gosport to become an enterprise zone. Business minister Mark Prisk visited the site earlier this week.

The time for TIF 'is now'

The coalition Government’s flagship legislation to empower local communities is to get its second reading in the House of Lords today. But for one senior property industry figure, the Localism Bill as it stands is missing one vital element: legislation that could pave the way to enable tax increment financing.

Peter Cosmetatos is director of policy (finance) at the British Property Federation and part of a Whitehall working group examining TIF, a funding tool that would allow councils to borrow money for infrastructure against the additional business rate income that it is expected to generate. Cosmetatos told Planning that it “didn’t make sense” to tie TIF to the Local Government Resource Review, which will conclude its first phase next month and looks likely to allow councils to keep locally-raised business rates.

“I think TIF should be legislated for in the Localism Bill. It should be now,” Cosmetatos told Planning. “The danger is that we’ve seen the LGRR slip by six months, and it could slip another six months. While the LGRR proposals around the retention of business rates might be the cause of that delay – because it’s complicated – why on earth can we not be getting on with a handful of TIF schemes based on some very simple enabling primary legislation that they could just shove into the Localism Bill? [TIF] is part of the localism agenda.”

As Planning reveals in the current issue, the London Borough of Barnet would be well placed to put itself forward as one of those schemes. It is already in the advanced stages of preparing a bid to use TIF to help finance the huge Brent Cross and Cricklewood regeneration scheme (pictured). But Barnet’s director of planning, housing and regeneration, Stewart Murray, conceded that a TIF scheme would be unlikely to be up and running until April 2013 at the earliest, in part because the Treasury’s bidding process still needs to be worked through.

That is too long to wait for Cosmetatos. “Potentially TIF is something that would give a bit more substance to local enterprise partnerships, to enterprise zones. It could give a very practical commercial kickstart to economic activity and investment in infrastructure that at least a handful of areas could benefit from."

The view from Westfield Stratford City

Last month saw the completion of the construction phase of one of the UK’s largest regeneration schemes, east London’s £1.45 billion Westfield Stratford City. On a recent tour of the shopping centre’s John Lewis anchor store, managing director Noel Saunders was surprisingly candid about his company’s goals: “We’re retailers, and we’re a business and we’re here to make money,” he said.

Yet Saunders is well aware that London Borough of Newham mayor Sir Robin Wales will do his upmost not to allow the development, which sits on the edge of the Olympic Park, to become just another concrete shrine to consumerism - even one that includes a 6,000sq metre casino and a 14-screen all-digital cinema. Wales wants jobs, and last month said the Government was “walking away” from its legacy goals on boosting local employment.

'We are a local shop, and with that will be local jobs'
Noel Saunders, managing director of Westfield Stratford City's John Lewis

Some time ago a taskforce established by mayoral economic body the London Development Agency set a target to use the Games to cut London worklessness by 70,000. John Lewis' Saunders says his store, which looks to open on schedule on 13 September, can help put a dent into that figure.

“We are a local shop, and with that will be local jobs,” he says as we walk past the frontage of a store marked ‘Jamie’s Italian’. “On offer will be 750 jobs, with 80 per cent ring-fenced for local people, and 400 for the long-term unemployed residents of Newham.

“John Lewis will be investing £35 million. But it’s not just about the investment – there’s a halo effect as well, in terms of commercial developments, housing and infrastructure. If you’re thinking of buying a new home in an area that’s being regenerated, this is a great place to invest. Five years ago it might not have been the first place on your list – now, it’s very much on the list.”

Wales will no doubt be hoping that the halo effect lasts long into the future.

Watch a slideshow of Westfield Stratford City images

'Enterprise Zone Watch' - #1

With the deadline for submitting enterprise zone bids fast approaching, Regeneration & Renewal thought it timely to compile a list of the plans being submitted by local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) so far.

'EZ Watch' will be a regular installment on the R&R blog, and will be updated over the next few weeks as more news emerges of LEPs' plans.

The Government has already announced the locations of the four 'vanguard' enterprise zones - in London, Manchester, Nottingham and Liverpool. But details of the remaining 17 enterprise zones have yet to be decided and LEPs have until the end of this month to submit their final submissions for a zone within their boundaries.

The coalition will then assess bids throughout July and is expected to announce the successful ones by the end of the summer.

The proposed sites have a common theme: they are existing business parks with undeveloped land close by, and the advanced manufacturing sector is widely identified as the main opportunity for growth.

Here is a summary of plans thus far...

- Coast to Capital LEP: Because the LEP covers a very broad area, it wants to see three main areas included within the zone: the Gatwick Diamond area to the north of Crawley and the south of Gatwick airport, including the 600-acre Manor Royal industrial estate; three areas of Bognor Regis including sites at Oldlands Farm, the Salt Box and the former LEC airfield; a site at Croydon, where the pan-London LEP has already said it wants an enterprise zone to be located.

- the Pan-London LEP has also said it plans to submit a bid for an enterprise zone in Tottenham.

- Worcestershire LEP wants to see the South Kidderminster Business Park and an adjoining 40ha site that has been cleared and is available for development to become an enterprise zone.

- York and North Yorkshire LEP: The proposed zone would cover Scarborough Business Park and a significant portion of undeveloped land adjacent to the park.

- Staffordshire LEP wants to submit a bid for an enterprise zone at Etruria Valley, the former home of the Wedgewood china factory, which is being developed into a major industrial park and an adjoining mixed-use development.

- Sheffield City Region LEP: The LEP wants its zone to incorporate three separate sites across the city-region: the Advanced Manufacturing Park at Waverley, the Sheffield Business Park close to the M1 outside the city, and land at Markham Vale that is currently being developed for the manufacturing and services industries. It also wants development sites west of the Dearne Valley in Barnsley to be included within the zone.

- Greater Birmingham and Solihull LEP wants Birmingham city centre to become an enterprise zone. However, because the LEP is one of the largest in the country, it also wants to create an 'enterprise belt' which would cover areas of southern Staffordshire and northern Worcestershire, along with the M42 corridor in Solihull.

In addition, the newly formed Lancashire LEP has said that it plans to submit a bid for an enterprise zone, but has not specified where it wants the zone to be located, while the new Humber LEP, which is awaiting final approval from the Government, has also said it wants to bid for an zone.

Unconfirmed press reports, meanwhile, have stated that the West of England LEP is considering two sites in Bristol - Avonmonth or the Temple Quarter - as potential locations for a zone, and other reports have claimed that it is "all but certain" that the Tees Valley will be designated an enterprise zone.

Anish Kapoor Olympic sculpture captured in new time-lapse footage

New time-lapse footage released last week by the Olympic Park Legacy Company shows the construction of the spiralling ArcelorMittal Orbit in east London's Olympic Park, which when completed will be become the tallest sculpture in the UK at 114.5 metres.

Download footage of the Orbit being constructed (MP4)

The Anish Kapoor and Cecil Balmond-designed ArcelorMittal Orbit will be owned by the OPLC, which is currently appointing an operator for the venue. Organisers say the attraction could reap up to £10 million each year, with a large proportion being ploughed back into regeneration of the area.

A spokesman for the OPLC said that there was no "finite lifespan" for the body, but that whatever happens, the Orbit would remain in public hands.

The Olympic Delivery Authority backed plans for the sculpture last August after taking into account concerns by the Government’s design watchdog, the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (Cabe).

The low-down from the National Regeneration Summit

Yesterday regeneration practitioners gathered at the Business Design Centre in Islington, London, for the annual National Regeneration Summit. Full coverage of the event can be found on our Regen.net website but, in the meantime, here are a few comments from speakers who took part in a panel session that focussed on 'how to deliver regeneration in an age of localism'.

Iain Tuckett, group director, Coin Street Community Builders - "There is undoubtedly a need for support for communities to help them get more involved in [the localism agenda], as currently, there are major questions of capacity within the voluntary and community sector."

Lord Shipley, member of the independent advisory panel for the Regional Growth Fund (RGF) and former leader of Newcastle City Castle - "At the moment the idea is to have two bidding rounds with a third round for 'slippage'. But my feeling is that the RGF will have to be extended beyond its three year lifespan and I very much hope that the government will look at this. [Read our full news story on this]

"The ball is very much with local authorities in terms of making local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) work. So I think there is a danger that geographical areas will not pull together in the interest of their sub-regions.

"Youth unemployment is a massive issue for me. I remember the 1980s and I do not want a repeat of them.

"I have a great fear of 'nimbyism' resulting from localism. It’s one thing to give neighbourhoods more power, but quite another to give them control over planning and housing decisions in their area."

Tony Burton, director, Civic Voice - "Are communities really being let in on the big decisions – that is the million, billion pound, strategic decisions? I don't think so."

Chris Brown, chief executive, Igloo Consulting - "The Localism Bill, as far as planning is concerned, has been written from a rural point of view, requiring the existence of district councils and so on, and [the reforms introduced in the bill] might not work so well in urban areas.

"I also have some questions about where any available public money will go. It seems to me that, through the coalition's policies, there will be some very big winners and some very big losers. The winners will be those areas that are already quite attractive to investors, and where there are development opportunities, meaning that many areas that are in serious need of regeneration might miss out."

The coalition and regeneration - one year on

In the same week that the the coalition Government marked its first anniversary, the communities and local government select committee was hearing evidence on the Regeneration to enable growth policy paper, which we reported on in February.

One witness, senior research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research North Katie Schmuecker, said of the paper: "If the document is meant as a strategy, it is weak. It reads rather more like a collection of government policies and the way they may apply to some deprived places." Another, chief executive of the Centre for Local Economic Strategies Neil McInroy, also told MPs that there was a lack of strategic direction in the Government's regeneration policy.

Against that somewhat gloomy backdrop, Colin Marrs examines the coalition's record on regeneration and economic development in its first year.

Policy Replacing regional development agencies with local enterprise partnerships
Verdict The Government chose to ignore robust evidence that the RDAs provided clear economic benefits to the regions, but there is no doubt that many local authorities welcomed the opportunity to take more control over economic development strategy. However, there are worries about a lack of effective coordination, and the LEPs may find themselves hamstrung by a lack of cash and powers. 5/10

Policy Establishing a Regional Growth Fund to help businesses affected by public sector job losses
Verdict The fact the fund was many times oversubscribed suggests that there is a pressing need for this cash. However, the overall fund - £1.4 billion spread over three years - is worth just a third of the annual budget for regional development agencies. There is little prospect of the fund assisting deprived areas in the South East. 6/10

Policy Establishing the New Homes Bonus to punish councils which fail to build new homes
Verdict An ambitious attempt to increase housebuilding through financial incentives rather than through the “top-down” targets so hated by Conservative ministers. Again, there are worries that the policy could lead to a lack of coordination, will fail to provide enough of an incentive to deal with the housing crisis, and will take money away from regeneration areas in the north to more affluent areas in the South. 4/10

Policy Establishing enterprise zones to promote business growth
Verdict It is too early to tell whether the zones will be able to make effective use of local development orders intended to prevent the problems caused in the 1980s and '90s. During this time, the zones’ low tax rates sometimes sucked business away from surrounding areas. Will the same mistakes be repeated? 6/10

Policy Producing a National Infrastructure Plan to guide investment in transport, energy and other utilities.
Verdict The document proves that the coalition understands the issues facing the country, but is less sure-footed when it comes to providing solutions. However, the document is a valuable first step in improving the UK’s infrastructure. 7/10

Policy Creating a Green Investment Bank to fund investment in carbon reduction technologies
Verdict Announced in the 2010 budget, Osborne tripled the government’s investment to £3 billion in his 2011 announcement. Critics pointed to the fact that the bank will not be able to borrow until 2015, although city experts claim that it will achieve more in the short term under the current arrangements. 8/10

Policy Investing £200m in a network of elite Technology and Innovation Centres
Verdict The announcement shows the coalition’s commitment to working towards a knowledge economy by investment in innovation. Some concerns over continued public funding and the effect on innovation if private cash dominates. 9/10

Follow Colin on Twitter at @yellercol

Pictured: The garden at number 10 Downing Street. Horticulture Week photo

Will the Regional Growth Fund deliver on jobs?

When the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Bis) announced the winning bids for the frst round of the £1.4 billion Regional Growth Fund (RGF) last month, it also published estimates for how many direct and indirect jobs - through supply chains and so on - will be created in each region.

The coalition Government has already said it expects that some £2.5 billion of private sector investment will be levered in as a result of the £450 million made available in the first round of the fund.

Now, using the jobs estimates, it has also predicted that some 27,000 jobs, and 100,000 indirect ones, will be "created or safeguarded" through Round One RGF-funded projects across the country,

But Regeneration & Renewal has asked Bis how these figures were calculated. The department's response raises questions over whether the method used was robust enough.

A Bis spokeswoman said: "The jobs figures are based on the number of jobs that each bid suggested would need to be created, safeguarded or created indirectly in order to keep the project up and running - based on what the company or organisations believe the overall cost of the project will be (so not just the Government's share of investment but including private sector investment too)."

So, the numbers of jobs is based on the estimate contained in applications - so could feasibly be over-optimistic - and on how many jobs would be needed for that project in an ideal world, not how many would likely be generated.

However, she did add: "Because all the bids are now subject to due diligence, the final allocation of money hasn't yet been decided, so final job numbers are yet to be confirmed.

"The businesses have given us those figures based on their professional experience of running business, and the staff numbers they believe they will need to deliver the project efficiently."

If the RGF-funded schemes do create anything like the predicted level of new jobs, then the fund could well be considered a success on its own terms, but the Government is going to have to work out a stringent monitoring and evaluation process to assess whether the promises made in the bids are kept.

Last mill standing

Video producer Tara Young of Etsy.com sent me a link to a short documentary that she made on the decline of Burnley's cotton industry, and in particular one of the few surviving textile mills in the area.

As the current issue of our sister title Planning reports, manufacturing and industry in the north of England did well out of the the first round of the Government's £1.4 billion Regional Growth Fund. But the fund’s £1 million minimum bid threshold meant small businesses were not direct applicants, although the first tranche of funding did include £150 million allocated for support for small enterprises. Joe McBride, the managing director of Lancashire Textiles, which employs around 20 people, says that there seems to be little interest in offering the industry in which he works targetted assistance.

"We're really up against it," McBride says. "I can see the company being here as long as I am."

It's a powerful documentary that poses the question: Is Lancashire's traditional economy worth preserving?

What will become of Grimethorpe?

The Government’s announcement earlier this month that 20 per cent of all land and property assets owned by the soon to be abolished regional development agencies (RDAs) will be sold on the open market – rather than being transferred to councils or the new local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) – will surely ruffle a few feathers.

For a start, a number of RDAs had stated in their asset disposal plans, submitted to the Government earlier this year, that they wanted a number of their assets to go to councils or LEPs so that they can continue to be managed locally.

Other RDAs had said in their plans that selling assets on the open market would not be preferable because this would exclude local authorities unable to place high enough bids to purchase land and property because of swingeing budget cuts.

They suggested that, as a solution, councils should take over some assets with a view to purchasing them at a later date when purse strings aren’t so tight – but the coalition has ruled out this option as well.

The RDAs declined to comment other than in basic statements "welcoming" the proposals. But I suspect that many in local government will consider it a blow that such a significant amount of state-owned property is being sold off to the private sector rather than being retained and benefit the local economy – particularly when you look at some of the assets earmarked for sale.

Included on the official list are a number of former coal and steel-mining sites, including the former Corus steelworks in Birmingham and Barnsley's Grimethorpe Colliery - which was made famous by director Mark Herman's 1996 film Brassed Off.

Nottinghamshire's Sherwood Energy Village, a not-for-profit business park that went into liquidation last year, is also on the list. It is unclear what impact the sale will have on the plans of a group of tenants who were last year looking into the possibility of setting up a workers' cooperative to take over ownership and/or management of the site.

The news also calls into question how Newcastle's planned development of the former Scottish & Newcastle Brewery site into a new science business and residential hub might progress once the site is sold off.

MPs have warned against a "fire sale" of RDA assets, claiming that this would be a bad idea "at a time when land prices remain depressed".

And, at Regeneration & Renewal’s Northern Summit in Manchester last October, delegates predicted a "smash and grab" of public land once the RDAs are abolished.

Are both these scenarios now looking increasingly likely? And would the assets be put to better use in private hands?

Photo by Draco2008

Land auctions: the unanswered questions

Like a late-night vindaloo, not all of last month's Budget was easy to digest.

One of its lesser reported, but still significant announcements, was plans for pilot schemes in which public land with planning permission is auctioned off to developers.

The Government is hoping that trialling the land disposal element of the land auctions model will boost development, because it allows for councils to capture most of the rise in land value created once planning permission has been granted. The architect of the land auction model, Tim Leunig, has written that in the South East, the value of one hectare of land rises 400-fold when planning permission has been granted. So the model could, in theory, result in some eye-popping gains for local authorities. Sir Peter Hall notes that in Hong Kong and Singapore (pictured), "controlled land leases are a major source of local revenues".

So, what’s the problem? Well, there are at least six of them, if you speak to one commercial property development lawyer. Gilbert Green, a partner at law firm Thomson Snell & Passmore who specialises in acting for developers buying land for development, highlights the following "defects" in the model, according to the (admittedly) scant detail known so far. Some of his reservations were echoed by other experts I've spoken to.

1. It is in effect a voluntary tax. If landowners do not offer land, then no revenue is raised by local authorities
2. It runs the risk of land being "promoted" for development in conflict with adopted plans and policy
3. It raises the spectre of local authorities being "influenced" in making decisions by the possible amount of financial benefit they may accrue from a decision
4. It does not provide an equal contribution to infrastructure or improvements by each permitted development as the contribution will be the difference (if any) between the "auction" price and the resale price
5. It will tie up even more local authority officer time when local authorities are already overburdened
6. It runs the risk of landowners actually withholding land from development.

There are a couple of other questions, too. The Treasury’s Plan for Growth document said that the model "would work alongside existing mechanism such as the Community Infrastructure Levy", the levy on development that is intended to raise funds for infrastructure. But how the land auctions model and CIL might work together is not yet clear.

Finally, and perhaps most crucially, is the question of when – if at all – the pilots will be opened up to privately owned sites. When I spoke to Leunig last month, he described the trialling of only the public land disposal element of the auctions model as a "non-announcement". Increasing the range of land should enhance competition and lower prices. Extending the model to private land would allow councils to buy sites that they want to see developed, grant planning permission and then auction them off to developers. Any uplift could then be recycled into infrastructure and help boost economic development.

These are some of the unanswered questions on the Government’s land auction model. No doubt I’ve missed some, so please post your thoughts below. The Treasury has said that the pilots are still months away, so there remains an opportunity to frame the debate.