\n<\/p>\n
Under the plans for the regions, an initial \u00a3285m in transitional seed funding will be allocated by the government next year to support mayors and local leaders – and reduce reliance on “fragmented bidding pots” in Whitehall, the Treasury said.<\/p>\n
The government will also confirm that it will work with mayors to design a new \u00a31.5bn borrowing facility from 2028, which would allow them to access capital needed to support local priorities.<\/p>\n
The Treasury said this could be put towards new homes, bringing high streets back to life, or improving transport links.<\/p>\n
Healey said: “Mayors and local leaders know what their communities need to grow, which is why we are giving them more money, more power and more capacity to get projects moving, build homes and make the right decisions for their areas.”<\/p>\n
Areas across the country which are not yet strategic authorities will be able to access a share of the \u00a3285m funding to “unlock projects which will contribute to growth in their areas”.<\/p>\n
The prime minister said: “I’m calling time on local leaders going cap in hand to Westminster. That is no way to run a country.”<\/p>\n
Claire Ward, chairwoman of the UK Mayors Network and Labour’s East Midlands mayor, said that having the “right powers and resources through increased devolution” would help turn “ambitious plans into reality and deliver real, lasting change” for communities.<\/p>\n
Lord Sadiq Khan, Labour’s mayor of London, said greater ability to invest could “help unlock transformational infrastructure projects” including the West London Orbital route, the extension of the Bakerloo Underground line and Docklands Light Railway, and the development of Stratford International station.<\/p>\n
However, Healey’s Budget preparations suffered a blow when the Treasury’s entrepreneurship adviser, Alex Depledge, announced she was resigning from the role. She will leave on Thursday, the day after the Budget.<\/p>\n
Start-ups, she told the Sunday Times, external<\/span><\/a>, were being treated as a “sideshow” and should not be pushed to the “margins of economic policy”.<\/p>\n “Keeping scale-ups on the fringes underestimates the contribution of our greatest companies, and we need to support and develop them on British shores at all costs,” she said.<\/p>\n