Fifth Report - Local economic growth

Select Committee

Public Accounts Committee HC 252 8 June 2022

Report Status Government responded

Conclusions & Recommendations 27 items (12 recs)

Source View on Parliament website

Government Response (AI assessment · 27 of 27 classified)

Accepted 4

Accepted in Part 2

Acknowledged 15

Not Addressed 4

Rejected 2

Government response

Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Fifth report from Session 2022-23 · published 2 Sep 2022

Read the government response ↗ Response on the tracker

Recommendations & Conclusions

15 results

4 Recommendation Acknowledged

There remains considerable uncertainty for Local Authorities around funding, structures and responsibilities for local economic...

Recommendation

There remains considerable uncertainty for Local Authorities around funding, structures and responsibilities for local economic growth. The Department extols the virtues of local plans for coordinating and achieving value for money from central government funding. However local authorities’ attempts at … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government recognises the local growth funding landscape has been complex and fragmented, and will set out a plan for streamlining the funding landscape this year; a new Levelling Up Cabinet Committee has also been established.

HM Treasury

6 Recommendation Acknowledged

Accountability for levelling up outcomes remains unsatisfactory.

Recommendation

Accountability for levelling up outcomes remains unsatisfactory. This Committee has reported before that government’s accountability arrangements had failed to keep pace with increasingly complex ways of delivering policies and services. and that this had weakened accountability to Parliament for the … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department has implemented a new architecture across central government to support delivery including the Levelling Up Cabinet Sub-Committee and will write to the Committee separately with further details once arrangements have been confirmed with new ministers.

HM Treasury

7 Recommendation Acknowledged

The Department does not yet know how it will measure performance on a consistent basis...

Recommendation

The Department does not yet know how it will measure performance on a consistent basis across different geographical areas and timescales. We are concerned that data availability and quality is not yet adequate to track progress against the Levelling Up … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation but disagrees with the conclusion on which it is based, and describes the role of the Spatial Data Unit and ONS in measuring progress against levelling up missions.

HM Treasury

10 Conclusion Acknowledged

We asked the Department how the part played by the devolved governments on the UK...

Conclusion

We asked the Department how the part played by the devolved governments on the UK Shared Prosperity Fund compared to their part in deciding the allocation of the European funds it is replacing. The Department explained that for the European … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department agrees with the committee's recommendation, but disagrees with the conclusion it is based on and states its priority is delivering effective investment in all parts of the UK and describes existing mechanisms for working with devolved administrations.

HM Treasury

11 Conclusion Acknowledged

The Department reassured us that it was expecting to work very closely with each of...

Conclusion

The Department reassured us that it was expecting to work very closely with each of the devolved Governments and with the individual local authorities responsible for delivery. We were, however, sceptical about how close past cooperation with devolved Governments had … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department agrees with the committee's recommendation, but disagrees with the conclusion it is based on and states its priority is delivering effective investment in all parts of the UK and describes existing mechanisms for working with devolved administrations.

HM Treasury

17 Conclusion Acknowledged

We queried whether making “up to” £600 million available for 2021–22 at the Spending Review...

Conclusion

We queried whether making “up to” £600 million available for 2021–22 at the Spending Review 2020 had set an expectation about the amount that would be awarded in the first year.51 The Department explained that this £600 million was the … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the committee's observation, explaining that the initial £600 million for the Levelling Up Fund was an early planning assumption, updated to £200 million at SR21, and actual spend was £128 million due to various economic factors. It provides a spending profile for Round 1 but commits to no new specific actions.

HM Treasury

19 Conclusion Acknowledged

This Committee reported in 2016 that government’s accountability arrangements had failed to keep pace with...

Conclusion

This Committee reported in 2016 that government’s accountability arrangements had failed to keep pace with increasingly complex ways of delivering policies and services and that this had weakened accountability to Parliament for the use of public funds.56 Noting the long … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department has implemented a new architecture across central government to support delivery including the Levelling Up Cabinet Sub-Committee and will write to the Committee separately with further details once arrangements have been confirmed with new ministers.

HM Treasury

20 Conclusion Acknowledged

We heard that a lot of the missions were cross-cutting and would require leadership from...

Conclusion

We heard that a lot of the missions were cross-cutting and would require leadership from several departments while others were more focussed and there would be more of a role for a lead department.59 For example, the Accounting Officer from … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees, and will implement a new architecture across central government to support delivery, including the Levelling Up Cabinet Sub-Committee. The department and HM Treasury will write to the Committee separately with further details once arrangements are confirmed with new ministers.

HM Treasury

21 Conclusion Acknowledged

We questioned the Department on why, despite billions of pounds spent on it over the...

Conclusion

We questioned the Department on why, despite billions of pounds spent on it over the years, there was so little evidence on what works for delivering local economic growth, particularly outside London. The Department’s Accounting Officer pointed to the inherent … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department agrees with the recommendation and will continue to fill evidence gaps through engagement and learning from evaluations; processes to feed evaluation findings into local growth activity and wider levelling up agenda is at the design stage.

HM Treasury

22 Conclusion Acknowledged

In 2019, this Committee reported that the Department did not understand what impacts its £12...

Conclusion

In 2019, this Committee reported that the Department did not understand what impacts its £12 billion Local Growth Fund had had on local economic growth yet had decided not to evaluate it.65 We were encouraged to learn that the Department … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department has a strong understanding of what works for local growth, is filling evidence gaps through engagement and forthcoming evaluations, and has established the Spatial Data Unit.

HM Treasury

23 Recommendation Acknowledged

The Department has been considering an overarching monitoring and evaluation framework for local growth to...

Recommendation

The Department has been considering an overarching monitoring and evaluation framework for local growth to include common objectives and outcomes, within which individual programme-level frameworks would sit. This would enable it to compare the relative effectiveness of similar initiatives and … Read more

Government Response Summary

The department agrees with the recommendation and will continue to fill evidence gaps through engagement and learning from evaluations; processes to feed evaluation findings into local growth activity and wider levelling up agenda is at the design stage.

HM Treasury

24 Recommendation Acknowledged

When we asked what success would look like for people in areas where, for example,...

Recommendation

When we asked what success would look like for people in areas where, for example, it is hard to get a job or the High Street is struggling, the Department highlighted the importance of taking a broad definition of growth.71 … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the recommendation but disagrees with the conclusion. They will continue to measure progress for most missions consistently, and are undertaking further work to develop those that are exploratory. The Spatial Data Unit will produce indicators, address current data gaps and measure progress.

HM Treasury

25 Conclusion Acknowledged

Two of the missions in the Levelling Up White Paper are ‘overarching’ missions.

Conclusion

Two of the missions in the Levelling Up White Paper are ‘overarching’ missions. The first is around living standards and includes measures of productivity, pay and jobs and the second is around measures of well-being.73 With reference to the first, … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation but disagrees with the conclusion on which it is based, and describes the role of the Spatial Data Unit and ONS in measuring progress against levelling up missions.

HM Treasury

26 Conclusion Acknowledged

When we asked the Department whether it expected to be able to get this data...

Conclusion

When we asked the Department whether it expected to be able to get this data quickly enough to be able to measure what impact the funds under its levelling-up agenda were having, the Department told us it would be able … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation but disagrees with the conclusion on which it is based, and describes the role of the Spatial Data Unit and ONS in measuring progress against levelling up missions.

HM Treasury

27 Conclusion Acknowledged

We asked the Department how it intended to pull together all this data to show...

Conclusion

We asked the Department how it intended to pull together all this data to show a big picture, as well as a local picture, to demonstrate the effectiveness of government’s levelling up agenda. The Department told us it had committed … Read more

Government Response Summary

The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation but disagrees with the conclusion on which it is based, and describes the role of the Spatial Data Unit and ONS in measuring progress against levelling up missions.

HM Treasury