Ministers always like to be associated with regeneration so it came as no surprise that last week's core cities conference in Nottingham was graced by one secretary of state (Hazel Blears), three ministers (Defra's Joan Ruddock, CLG's John Healey and Lord Digby Jones) and the Government's chief scientific adviser, Sir David King. This was partly because the core cities group is a CLG-sponsored body but also because this Government in particular places huge store on regenerating the regions with the eight cities as the driving force and with a new sub-regional focus. So it was a good opportunity for Hazel Blears to announce the 13 new sub-regions working on multi-area agreements, six of which include core cities. Curiously some of these bear resemblance to the long-abolished metropolitan county councils which were scrapped by Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. Perish the thought that the wheel is being re-invented. Inevitably, however much ministers tried to avoid the dreaded ‘s' word, it kept surfacing. No, this is not about structure, they repeated. Ms Blears insisted the public was not interested in institutions or structure, although several times she mentioned the word ‘architecture' – a new, politically correct term for structure, perhaps? She said councils and their partners should just ‘get on with the job' without the need to create new ‘institutional frameworks' beforehand. Ms Blears was even asked if she might impose an MAA should a group of councils be unable to get agreement. Certainly not was her response. However she did leave the door ever-so-slightly open when she said during a panel discussion that if there was a case for ‘a different structure' to deliver the MAA's goals then the Government might have to help out. At a press briefing afterwards, she said: ‘If there's a need for a statutory framework then we'll look at it.' So MAAs could well lead to sub-regions with statutory responsibilities, a prospect which will please many councils, especially if these are devolved down from Government. For however much local government's obsession with structure irks them, ministers have to recognise that councils like to have some idea of how formal their partnering arrangements can be. Michael Burton, Editor, The MJ
