Occasionally Crawley Borough Council has been approached to see if the town would be interested in applying for city status.
While ‘status’ can be important, it would be far better if this accolade carried with it real benefits for Crawley. Conventionally we are taught that a city has a cathedral, with the tiny ‘city’ of St. David’s in South West Wales often being given as an example. Well, we don’t have one of those but we have other attributes of a small city, thinking of the size and diversity of our population, and of our commercial and industrial base. The latter supplies 37 per cent of West Sussex business rates on two per cent of the land area.
In this context, it is pleasing that Henry Smith MP has written to the Deputy Prime Minister requesting that he consider awarding Crawley ‘City Deal’ status. Locations that acquire this status can create agreements between central government and themselves to decide on the spending of public money, create economic growth, and gain and take responsibility for more decisions that affect their area.
Independent analyses of Crawley’s economic prospects support such a bid. The Centre for Cities annual ‘Cities Outlook’ report ranked Crawley in the top 10 locations for many key economic indicators. At the end of 2012, independent economic research consultants ranked Crawley as one of the top places in the country to do business.
Looking at the 64 cities in the United Kingdom, we have the seventh largest business stock per 10,000 people and also the seventh lowest JSA (Job Seekers’ Allowance) claimant count. We rank fifth for growth in private sector employment. There are plenty of other measures which show that Crawley is an economic power house.
City deals are about unlocking growth and a number of such initiatives are already in progress elsewhere in the country. An example is the Bristol City Deal whose components include a growth incentive where a greater proportion of business rates will be retained locally. Other elements of this deal include more power and influence over transport infrastructure and the development of people and skills.
The key principles around City Deals are around the stronger empowering of local communities to make decisions in support of economic growth coupled with rewards for success from central government. Our local economic track record makes Crawley a strong candidate for this opportunity, to secure an even greater regional leadership position.