"The coalfields regeneration
programme has achieved positive results in job generation and
improved environments. However, the programme has taken much
longer than expected to deliver results and needs to be much better
planned. What we want to see is a concerted effort to deliver
to the coalfields the best possible value for money from the
remaining £450 million of
funds."
Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, 17
December 2009
Whitehall initiatives to revive former
coalfield communities have helped to make them more attractive
places to live and work but many remain among the most deprived
areas in England and opportunities to help train local people and
promote local businesses have been missed, the NAO has today
reported.
The regeneration effort has three strands: the
National Coalfields Programme, to decontaminate and find uses for
former coalfield sites; the Coalfield Regeneration Trust, to
provide grants to community projects; and the Enterprise fund, to
support businesses. The cost for these three schemes is £630
million to date and spending is set to reach almost £1.1
billion.
The National Coalfields Programme has brought
into new use 54 of 107 former coalfield sites, making them suitable
for private development or recreational use; and work is underway
on a further 22 sites. Private developers have built housing and
employment space on 44 sites. The Programme expects to have
treated 90 per cent of land by its target completion date of 2012
and it will take twice the ten-year timescale of the original
Programme to achieve its aims for housing and employment space.
While the Trust has helped to fund over 3,000
community projects and exceeded most of its targets, including
building or enhancing over 2,300 community centres, because of
strict funding cycles for departments it can currently offer
support only up to 2011 and so the future of many projects is at
risk.
The Department took five years to put the
Enterprise Fund in place because of delays in meeting state aid
requirements and protracted and unsuccessful negotiations with a
private bank. The Fund has invested £6.5 million in 23
companies employing a total of 312 people.
The NAO found there is no overall strategy to
coordinate the three initiatives and each reports and accounts for
its work in isolation. A forum established in 2007 to co-ordinate
efforts across Whitehall has met only six times, is poorly attended
and has no substantive actions to date. At the local level the NAO
found the Trust and the Fund could work more closely with the
National Coalfields Programme to help train people to benefit from
jobs created by the regeneration and to promote local business
moving onto employment space developed on the sites. In addition,
the Homes and Communities Agency and some Regional Development
Agencies each claim all the credit for jobs created on coalfield
sites, resulting in over-reporting of the benefits.
While jobs are being created in the former
coalfield areas, data suggests that these areas have been
particularly affected by the recession. Deprivation remains a
problem despite a three per cent improvement from 2004. In 2007, 37
per cent of former coalfield areas were ranked among the most
deprived in the country.
Publication details:
HC: 84, 2009-10
ISBN: 9780102963359