The local authorities which make up the Western Gateway partnership have pledged to continue to co-operate as central government funding for pan-regional partnerships is withdrawn.
The UK Government has issued a decision to cease funding any pan-regional partnerships which have an English Mayoral Combined Authority within their geography – including the Western Gateway – from March 31 2025.
All 28 local authorities that make up the partnership are committed to continuing cross border collaboration, especially to continue work on tidal energy in the Severn Estuary, said the Western Gateway. But without Government funding the secretariat team in its current form will cease to function from June 6 2025.
More than 100 business and academics responded to a UK Government consultation on the decision around funding for the Western Gateway Partnership just before Christmas.
In a letter from UK Government Minister Jim McMahon to the partnership, he made it clear that this decision was based on the role that Mayoral Combined Authority Mayors would now play in bringing together pan-regional areas.
The Western Gateway said this was “despite the fact that Mayoral Combined Authorities do not exist in Wales and therefore cross-border economies like the Western Gateway would not be supported by this new model”.
It added:
“This will be an end of an era for the partnership which has played a prominent role in ensuring South Wales and Western England becomes the fastest-growing economic area outside of London in just under five years.”
In its fifth year of existence as a Pan-Regional Partnership, the Western Gateway brought in more than £2 million of in-kind and financial support for its work from local and national organisations, it said.
The partnership has launched the Severn Estuary Commission to look at harnessing the UK’s largest tidal range; attracted more than £100 million to ensure the area can develop the UK’s first Small Modular Reactors and hosted three national conferences attracting more than 1,500 business leaders and Government Ministers to the area, it said.
Despite this success, UK Government funding was essential to underwrite the everyday costs for the partnership team, the Western Gateway added.
In addition to continuing work to deliver the potential of tidal energy in the Severn Estuary, the partnership has committed to providing a platform for the 28 local authorities in the area to take part in the UK’s largest investment conference at UKREiiF 2025 in May. This will be a key opportunity for all the local authorities to come together to drive investment into the area and discuss a future for the cross border collaboration between the key economic forces of South Wales and Western England, it said.
Chair of the Western Gateway Partnership Sarah Williams-Gardener said:
“This is a hugely disappointing decision from the UK Government. Despite representation from Welsh Government calling for talks on how both governments can work together on this, requests to meet from business and locally elected leaders and MPs, they have refused to engage with any of us from our area on this decision.
“It’s been a great journey we’ve been on having delivered hundreds of millions of pounds of investment into key sites across the area; putting together a credible, locally supported cross border economic plan for growth which recognises our natural economic geography; and bringing together leaders from across the political spectrum to deliver for the 4.8 million people who live here.
“Whilst the UK Government has decided to put the brakes on this massive economic opportunity, I and our board of local authority leaders are committed to ensuring we can still deliver on our area’s potential. The evidence our partnership has uncovered shows that our area can become the fastest growing economy outside of London and we will do what we can to achieve this, with or without the Government’s help.”
Last week an independent commission of experts recommended that the UK Government acts now to harness the “huge potential” for tidal range energy in the Severn Estuary.
The Severn Estuary Commission was launched last year by the Western Gateway, which said that it would now be down to the local authorities who make up the partnership to work with UK and Welsh Governments alongside industry to see how the recommendations could be put into action.
