🚨 Today we publish State of the North 2025 🚨
The North gets just half as much arts and culture funding per person as London. We reveal the impact this & other regional divides have on young people, and what must change 👇
www.ippr.org/articles/the...
In our thoughts on Green Book reform published yesterday we set out ideas for better methods for capturing the benefits multi-faceted, transformational investments www.arup.com/insights/a-n...
And because combined & local authorities don’t have independent fiscal powers they cannot generate the long-term stable revenue streams to underpin private sector investment
One of the reasons we don’t see enough big game-changing projects that combine transport, housing, regen, innovation, skills etc is that the current approach to investment across different govt departments and funding streams is so piecemeal (inc appraisal methods)…..
I appreciate this is a bit of a niche topic but you might be interested in our thoughts on how the HM Treasury Green Book 📗should be revised, and use improved.
www.arup.com/insights/a-n...
Third time lucky. We actually did it! #CPFC
❤️💙🦅🦅
Trump will get even more angry with Harvard, this time for promoting the principle of Habeas Corpus
Blossom on The Grove in #Ilkley this afternoon.
Bradford City Hall in 1875.
From the Historic England photo archive. heritagecalling.com/2025/02/27/a...
Strong Yorkshire, strong Australia.
I agree with every single word of this.
As @britainremade.bsky.social have pointed out the one mile Digbeth extension to the West Midlands Metro required a TWAO application of 5718 pages across 52 documents (laid end to end the documents would be the same length as the tram extension itself).
www.britainremade.co.uk/backontrack
If it includes a lot of design work for the infrastructure and masterplan, generally required for a full business case, then it is not an unreasonable sum.
Also, don’t forget about ecological surveys, consultation, legal costs etc
This is very good.
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Wrote about whether Labour has a plan for regional growth, after a speech last week in which the most eye catching headlines were all in the south east
on.ft.com/3EnEmCR
3. But there have been longstanding concerns that the Green Book provides a framework that prioritises investment in places that already have successful economies, at odds with the agenda to boost prosperity in all parts of the UK.
For example
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2. The Green Book is HM Treasury's guidance on how to appraise policies, projects and programmes. Most people agree that we need a coherent framework for considering the benefits of government investments to inform decision-making and demonstrate value for money.
1. Sounds wonkish, but this is really important.
The Government have announced another review of the @hmtreasury Green Book as part of a recent announcement of measures to boost economic growth.
In this article I suggest 7 calls to action. 🧵
www.linkedin.com/posts/tom-br...
The most notable thing about the government announcement today of two pilot projects to work with Mayors / city regions to promote inward investment is the fact that this needs to be piloted as a specific initiative. Shouldn’t this be happening already?
www.gov.uk/government/n...
25 reasons to be optimistic in 2025. I do not subscribe to all the doom and gloom about the UK. When it comes to topics such as the economy, regeneration, housing, infrastructure and good government I believe there is a lot to be positive about.
www.linkedin.com/posts/tom-br...
Lovely walk today at Bolton Abbey.
16/16. Will Leeds & Bradford get a tram? Will the Humber get investment in big clean energy projects? Will the hourly, slow, uncomfortable rail service I was on when writing this between Leeds and Goldthorpe improve?
15. Because ultimately, outside a small bubble of policy wonks, people won’t care about devo-by-default, integrated settlements, Local Growth Plans and so on. They will want to see tangible improvements and progress.
14. 🎯And they will need to develop and implement more integrated outcomes and assurance frameworks and business cases, to guide decision-making, inform policy with evidence on what works and act as a gateway to delivery.
13. CAs will need to partner effectively with local authorities who will be central to effective delivery. See also post #6 above.
12. In the case of new or emerging CAs this will mean they need to build delivery-focused organisations from day one, and for some more established CAs they will need a step-change given their increased powers and expectations on them.
11. They will need to strike the right-balance between focusing on a small number of strategic priorities, while getting to grips with a wider range of responsibilities and Realpolitik of demonstrating progress to communities across their areas…..
10. My over-all takeaway is that for CAs / SAs it will be all about delivery, about “getting shit done” They need to rapidly develop their capabilities to develop and deliver capital projects and funding programmes effectively – and do so across a wider range of policy areas…..
