Executive Summary
So we want to make the system less top-heavy, devolving responsibility to collaborative partnerships with employers at their centre. This is already happening through initiatives like the Working Neighbourhoods Fund, City Strategy and Multi-Area Agreements (MAA).
In the spirit of our partnership approach, this paper sets out our thinking on the next steps, which should be seen as part of an ongoing dialogue about the best ways to build truly responsive services. The key elements of this are:
- partnerships should reflect the geography of their local labour markets;
- the MAA process will normally be the means by which DWP and DIUS will conduct any dialogues with local areas about de volving responsibilities;
- there should be strong employer representation within an MAA before government would consider devolving particular responsibilities;
- partnerships should have strong relationships with partners at other geographical levels, such as Local Strategic Partnerships and Regional Development Agencies;
- they should be developing proposals that add value for their local areas; and
- the partners should be using discretionary funding, such as the Working Neighbourhoods Funds, to complement core programmes.
Given the success of City Strategy Pathfinders to date, the Government will make available continued support beyond April 2009 for Pathfinders who can show that they are making real progress to tackle worklessness, raise skills and reduce poverty.
We would expect the City Strategy Pathfinders to evolve into an integral part of emerging local and sub-regional governance arrangements.
Passing responsibility down to a more local level has created new opportunities to make government services work more closely together. Good providers and leading partnerships are making the linkages already and central government is keen to support them.
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