In a speech last week at the Institute of Welsh Affairs, the leader of Cardiff Council, Councillor Rodney Berman called on the Welsh Government to urgently create the conditions for local authorities in South East Wales to work together as a city region to best promote growth and create jobs.
Cardiff has been lobbying for developing a city region approach in Wales for some time and the recent announcement by the Welsh Government that a working group to look at the issues is going to be established has been welcomed.
However, in these turbulent economic times more urgency is needed to ensure local authorities are given the ability to work together and take into consideration the needs and demands of their neighbours to effectively compete as a city region on a national and international level when assessing issues such as allocating land for housing, business and employment.
Cllr Berman said, “The reality is the Cardiff-city region already exists in an economic and social geographical sense and Cardiff Council has long championed the notion of the Welsh Government officially sanctioning a city region approach to economic development.
“In areas such as planning this is critical to our future prosperity. The Welsh Government’s current planning framework based around Local Development Plans is simply not fit for purpose, in my view, because it leads to individual local authorities producing their plans in isolation from each other. More joined-up planning at a city region scale would avoid the oversupply of land for employment and housing that is currently contained within the Local Development Plans brought forward across the South East Wales region to date. In the case of allocating land for employment, oversupply is potentially very damaging to our regional economy.
“It could mean, for example, that the amount of income a developer might hope to obtain from renting space to businesses in a new development of offices or industrial units would be reduced. Also, if employment land is too plentiful, a developer might also worry that they would face too much competition from similar developments that might take place close by and not be able to rent the space they might build.
“All of this means that developers could be put off building here in the first place meaning opportunities for securing much-needed new jobs are lost.”
Cardiff Council is therefore calling on the Welsh Government to secure a new approach so that difficult strategic planning decisions to be taken on housing, development and transport can take full account of their wider city region implications.
There are many examples where this strategy has been successfully implemented including Scotland, Manchester, Stuttgart and Vancouver and we should follow these examples. A central element of all these examples is the recognition that it’s possible to deliver more through producing a coherent planning and economic strategy on a regional basis rather than working in isolation, or worse, competition.
Cllr Rodney Berman added, “With unemployment rising and the economic climate likely to remain challenging, Wales needs to do all it can to stimulate new jobs but the Welsh Government’s planning policies work against that goal.
“The Welsh Government may now be reviewing the position but there is a need to assess this issue with more urgency and seize the opportunity to work together for the benefit of the wider South East Wales region.
“We need to look and learn from Scotland, Manchester and city regions further afield to compete in a global market in such difficult times. For years Wales’ economic performance has lagged behind other parts of the UK. This gap will widen unless we change course and do so, quickly. By working together, we stand a much better chance of taking this region forward.”
