Supporting Growth at Local Level
Regulation and Enterprise
The Local Growth White Paper highlights central Government's role in creating the conditions for UK business success by tackling barriers that inhibit growth and equipping local areas with the tools they need to create and shape dynamic and entrepreneurial local economies. There is a need to tackle excessive, disproportionate or badly-enforced regulation but effective and efficient regulation is a tool that local authorities have at their disposal to improve their local trading environment, increase business confidence and support their local economies.
Government-led initiatives to identify, limit and reduce unnecessary regulatory stock and flow will have a positive impact upon the number of regulations that businesses need to comply with. It also remains important that businesses on the ground have a good understanding of how to remain compliant with the regulations that are required.
Local Enterprise Partnerships: an opportunity
As announced in the Local Growth White Paper, Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) are a key local delivery mechanism designed to facilitate growth promotion across the UK and therefore have a role to play in leading changes in how businesses are regulated locally. Their business-led nature means that they are well placed to identify, understand and address local barriers to enterprise and put initiatives in place that actively improve the local trading environment in a number of ways:
- Support the delivery of local business accountability: LEP-led private sector engagement can identify the key local barriers to compliance, allowing public and private sector partners to work together to develop tailored initiatives that better target available resources and enable businesses to comply in a quicker and more time effective way
- Promote a positive regulatory culture: LEP-led initiatives can promote a positive regulatory culture on the ground, based on mutual understanding and shared outcomes
- Co-ordinate the way that business support is developed: LEPs can provide the partnership structure to coordinate a business support approach across an entire economic area and reduce duplication and wasted effort
- Improve the business environment for all local businesses in the LEP area: LEP-wide regulatory initiatives focused on tailored advice and support can minimise burdens and maximise support for all local businesses, but will offer particular benefits for small businesses that lack in house support
- Provide a source of intelligence about shared challenges: LEPs provide the opportunity for local areas to identify and highlight common regulatory issues, where the Government needs to act to support the creation of the conditions for growth
Pathfinder activity
Greater Birmingham and Solihull LEP and Leicester and Leicestershire LEP are already undertaking some work to explore how LEP-wide regulatory initiatives can contribute to the improvement of the local trading environment. Further information about this pathfinder activity will be available via this webpage shortly.
A role for LBRO
The Business Minister, Mark Prisk, recognises the important role played by local authority regulators such as trading standards and environmental health in promoting local growth and is calling for regulators to get involved in LEPs to tackle red tape at local level. He announced that LBRO as a new streamlined body should work with LEPs to identify regulatory approaches that support local enterprise and make this learning available to others.
LBRO will therefore be looking to work with LEPs to create the conditions in which local initiatives can deliver the growth outcomes needed in their areas.
For more information about this work, please contact Claire Bridges, Director (email - claire.bridges@lbro.org.uk; tel - 0121 226 4039)