VCS Engagement with Marches Enterprise Partnership
West Midlands Rural Community Action Network have secured resources through RAWM for work to be undertaken to explore how the voluntary and community sector in the Marches area may be able to engage and influence the work and priorities of the Marches Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP). The VCS in the Marches and the LEP hope that through this work the VCS will be able to engage at a strategic level. The sector also aims to raise awareness and increase understanding of the contribution it makes to the Marches economy.
Claire Carter and Sarah Fishbourne from Impact Consultancy have been contracted to undertake this work and have been reviewing VCS engagement with LEP’s from across the country and making contact with key VCS organisations and stakeholders across the Marches via existing structures and other routes. The next phase of this work will involve the production of information briefings and wider engagement of the sector through hosting and attending events across Shropshire, Herefordshire and Telford. The first of these will be on the 7th April as part of the annual meeting of the Shropshire Voluntary and Community Sector Assembly.
Background to the Marches LEP
In June last year the Government announced its intention to abolish Regional Development Agencies, such as Advantage West Midlands, and to replace them with Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP’s). Businesses and local councils were invited to come together to lead local economic development and generate private-sector led growth and job creation in their areas and to put together partnerships based on ‘functional economic areas’ rather than regions.
The Marches Local Enterprise Partnership (Marches LEP), which encompasses Herefordshire, Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin, was one of 24 successful bids to be approved in the first round of LEP’s. The Marches LEP has set up a board and has recently appointed an independent chair from the private sector, Geoffrey Davies, managing director of Ludlow-based agricultural vehicle company McConnel and vice-president of Alamo. The Board are currently in the process of developing the LEP’s business plan which will come into effect from April 2011(please see http://www.marcheslep.org.uk/live/welcome.asp?id=2937 )
Although LEP’s have been encouraged by central government to involve the voluntary and community sector there is no statutory obligation for LEP’s to do so. Initial research undertake by Regional Action West Midlands (RAWM) indicates that LEP’s engagement with the VCS is patchy and that where it is happening the focus is on social enterprise as opposed to recognising the important contribution that the wider sector makes to the economy as an employer, through providing routes to employment and through the provision of services.
Should you require further information about this work please contact: Claire Carter 01694 731 759 jigsawconsultancy@btinternet.com or Sarah Fishbourne 01432 860 323 sfishbourne@tiscali.co.uk
