£8.4 billion of EU funding needs replacing

Local areas need £8.4 billion of European Union funding replaced as part of a locally-led successor to EU regional aid after Brexit, a new report says.

In a new report published by the Local Government Association (LGA), Beyond Brexit, the LGA says local areas across the UK had been set to receive a total of £8.4 billion between 2014 and 2020. It says any UK successor scheme needs to be at least of equivalent value to this.

The EU money has been vital in creating jobs, supporting small and medium enterprises, delivering skills, and boosting local growth across the country.

In its referendum manifesto, the government pledged to create a UK Shared Prosperity Fund to replace the money local areas currently receive from the European Union.

Council leaders want to work with government to avoid defaulting to a silo-approach and creating a like-for-like replacement of the current EU programme, which is often bogged down in government bureaucracy and delay.

The LGA said Brexit provides provides an opportunity to give local areas greater say over how to target a new and simplified regional aid fund on local projects of benefit for local people and economies and best support infrastructure, environment, enterprise and social cohesion.

Kevin Bentley, chairman of the LGA’s Brexit Task and Finish Group, said: “Since the referendum, one of the biggest concerns for councils has been the future of vital EU regeneration funding. Councils have used EU funds to help new businesses start up, create thousands of new jobs, roll out broadband and build new roads and bridges.

“Securing a government commitment around this vital regeneration funding has been an important step. To further its devolution commitments, we want to work with the Government to help develop a fully-funded and locally-driven successor scheme with local government in areas of all types.

“Current EU funding is allocated over a seven-year period. This long-term distribution must be maintained to allow for long-term planning. Funding must be easier to access and local areas need full control over how it is spent and what projects it is spent on.

“With national funding for regeneration increasingly being depleted, all local areas have become increasingly reliant on EU money and local areas are desperate to get on with creating jobs, building infrastructure and boosting growth.”