Cash aimed at helping businesses to grow has plunged to zero in a major Devon area after changes to government funding.
For the first time in around half a century, East Devon District Council will not be getting money to support business growth in its area.
Cabinet members heard that the loss of the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) and related rural funding meant the area wouldn’t see cash to bolster economic activity from central government.
The UKSPF was the replacement for the European Structural and Investment Programme, and is now being usurped by the new Local Growth Fund – likely to be targeted mainly at mayoral city regions – and the Pride in Place Programme that is focusing spending on the 339 most deprived neighbourhoods.
Parts of Plymouth do feature within that cohort based on the metric of deprivation the government uses, but no other areas of Devon do.
“One of the big changes that has happened is that we will no longer have the UK Shared Prosperity Fund and local growth funding – which was previously EU funding – for the first time in about half a century,” Tom Winters, the council’s economic development manager, told cabinet members.
“That means we will be turning from funders to a more traditional role of being enablers… with a renewed focus on helping employment land to come forward and supporting town centres.”
Figures from a previous presentation showed that East Devon secured more than £1.14 million in UKSPF funding and an additional £640,000 in money from the Rural England Prosperity Fund in the 2024/25 financial year, which fell to a combined £721,000 in the last financial year, but is now zero.
Projects that have already been assigned UKSPF funding or have received it will continue to be delivered.
Councillor Paul Hayward (Independent, Axminster), the cabinet member for assets and economy, said he shared the “concerns about the drop in funding and wish there was more money and more resources to help boost economic development in East Devon”.
“But, there is positive news, despite the funding challenges, and I give kudos to the economy team here for doing what it can and we just have to work together to boost the economy.,” he said.
“All high streets are suffering in East Devon, and even in the most affluent of towns there are challenges as the world of retail and retail experiences and habits change.”
The change in funding landscape means East Devon has altered its economic development strategy, and so has said it cannot run future rounds of the major grant schemes, such as the Carbon Action Fund or Innovation and Resilience Fund.
“Priorities have therefore been amended to reflect our role as ‘enabler’ rather than ‘funder’,” the report prepared for the cabinet stated.
“It is being proposed that officer time and resources previously focussed on activity linked to UKSPF now be allocated to what can be called ‘traditional’ or ‘conventional’ economic development work.
“This includes being more active in the commercial property market and engaging more actively with our town centres.
“This refocusing, and the new work stemming from it, will be in addition to those EDS priorities not impacted by the loss of central funding, which will continue as normal.”
The cabinet voted to accept these changes.
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