Our role as the essential link between central and local Government and its partners is strengthened by the report, which emphasises the critical part we play in improving the regional, local and neighbourhood delivery of Government priorities. We will be at the heart of the developing new relationship between Government and localities.
Key Priorities
We will build on our strong local and regional intelligence, good working relations with regional and local partners and our ability to speak for central Government in the region to:
- Bring a sharper focus on place-based working structured around specific local areas, with an emphasis on performance
- Translate central Government policies into joined-up delivery, particularly through Local Area Agreements and Multi-Area Agreements
- Support and challenge the development of regional strategies to ensure consistency between different regional strategies and assist the smooth implementation of the Sub-National-Review
- Develop a more strategic engagement with central Government
- Manage the transitional arrangements for EU Programmes (see document below)
Locality Management
Understanding the distinctiveness of places, applying Government policies in the light of the diverse circumstances of places, and helping shape policies so that they work for particular places - is the key unique selling point for the Government Offices.
GOSW is leading a GO Network project that will shape the working with place agenda to drive more effective local delivery. The project will deliver:
- A clear understanding of what 'locality management' and the role of locality managers involves
- An agreed approach to 'locality management' in GOs with appropriate variation to reflect regional differences.
- An agreed approach to GO networking to support locality management
- Identified skills and competencies needed to deliver effective locality management and proposals for their development in the network
- An agreed 'offer' to Whitehall on Locality Management
