Meet the members of the YPIP team

YPIP in white font with blue background

Meet the YPIP Team and the Communities Innovating Yorkshire Fund

The core YPIP team are now all in post and working together to drive forward the project with partners across the region:

  • Holly Ingram is the YPIP Project Manager. Holly has a background in modern languages and has worked in a range of Higher Education project roles over the last 5 years including digital education, intercultural opportunities and research culture – h.l.ingram@leeds.ac.uk
  • Lizzie Bonsor is the YPIP Administrator. She has worked in a range of refugee-facing organisations over the last five years both within Leeds and further afield, including charities, community interest companies and community organisations – e.a.bonsor@leeds.ac.uk
  • Lauren Cox is the YPIP Communications and Engagement Manager. Lauren has worked with the voluntary, community, faith, and social enterprise (VCFSE) sector across Luton and Bedfordshire for the last 5 and a half years in roles with the local authority and a criminal justice charity – l.a.cox@leeds.ac.uk
The YPIP team: Lizzie Bonsor (top left), Lauren Cox (top right), Holly Ingram (bottom)

YPIP and Y-PERN are currently working on aligning their online presence and creating a website that will host both initiatives.

One of the key pieces of upcoming work is the ‘Communities Innovating Yorkshire Fund’ which will launch in early 2025.

This fund will be used on emerging projects, studies, activities, and ideas that reflect YPIP’s focus on accelerating community-led inclusive and sustainable growth. Projects must bring together a collaboration of different stakeholders through meaningful community engagement. There will be two funding pathways to be inclusive of grassroot and larger scale community organisations to demonstrate their innovative ideas.

Watch this space for further updates on the fund, and please do give a heads up to partners who are working across our themes in the region. Contact the team at ypip@leeds.ac.uk

Universities collaborating for the good of our regions is fast becoming a policy imperative

Y-PERN’s Policy Director Dr Peter O’Brien and Diana Beech, chief executive of London Higher explore the kinds of value that are created when higher education institutions work together regionally.

Keir Starmer’s new Labour government is committed to delivering five key missions: growth; NHS reform; clean energy; safer streets; and opportunity for all. Underpinning this approach is a shift towards a more active, smarter state that works in partnership with business, trade unions, local leaders, and devolved governments, guided by a new industrial strategy that seeks equitable economic growth across the country.

A sub-national architecture of devolution is taking root in England as a model of civic leadership, led by mayors and mayoral combined authorities. An English Devolution Bill is also set to drive further effective regional development by giving mayoral combined authorities and local authorities greater capacity and resources to set out ambitious growth agendas for the regions and to pull the necessary levers to achieve those ambitions.

In London, the capital’s devolved infrastructure goes back 25 years, while in Yorkshire, by June 2025, there will be four mayoral combined authorities with elected mayors covering Hull and East Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, and York and North Yorkshire. Devolution is always an unfinished story; as devolved administrations mature, they build capacity to take on more responsibility and accomplish more.

There are significant opportunities for higher education institutions in Labour’s adoption of a place-based, partnership-led approach, bringing in skills, research and innovation, educational opportunity, public sector productivity, and effective policymaking at the regional level. But it will also test the capability of universities to forge and sustain meaningful regional collaborations with each other and with regional policymakers and industry.

Our combined experience of working in regional university networks shows the power and impact that networked collaboration among higher education institutions can have, but as a sector we need to collectively buy into the idea that collaboration for the good of our regions is not an optional nice-to-have, but a core part of the higher education mission.

Strength in diversity

Policymakers and their teams have lots of stakeholders and priorities, and limited bandwidth. Regional groupings of universities offer the golden opportunity for efficiency in connecting up policymaking to expert insight and research, without the need to go from institution to institution.

One of the real strengths a regional network can offer is access to diversity of institutional knowledge; with research-intensive, modern and specialist universities involved in both our networks, our collective views are nuanced and our access to insight very broad indeed, meaning we can broker expertise across a wide range of local priorities.

This capability is seen at its most powerful through strategic engagement with regional policymakers. London, for example, has a plethora of boards and policy initiatives such as the London Partnership Board, which brings together representatives of key institutions across the capital including business, health, local government, and further education to build London’s capability to tackle future challenges.

In Yorkshire, a ground-breaking memorandum of understanding between Yorkshire Universities and Yorkshire and Humber Councils provides a framework for a long-term strategic partnership between local government and higher education in the region. The Yorkshire and Humber Policy Engagement & Research Network (Y-PERN) facilitates inclusive and place-based academic policy engagement, while the Yorkshire and Humber Policy Innovation Partnership (Y-PIP) is expanding the range of research activity co-designed and co-delivered between the region’s universities, policymakers, local communities and businesses to help drive positive, practical change within and across Yorkshire.

It’s worth adding that the London Higher and Yorkshire Universities staff are accustomed to working with policymakers, skilled in generating ideas and connections, and knowledgeable about the policy landscape – that doesn’t mean that individual institutions don’t need those capabilities to some degree, but having a shared hub of expertise has a helpful amplification effect and can be a space for capacity building on the development, monitoring and evaluation of policy and its impacts.

Regional growth

The dual role of universities in educating a highly skilled workforce and driving innovation and knowledge exchange through research means that they are critical delivery partners in regional economic growth agendas. Regional networks can play a role not only in forging collaborations between universities, but in connecting the sector to business and local communities.

Each of our organisations has a clear – though slightly different – theory of how our member higher education institutions collectively contribute to economic growth, including through tackling specific productivity challenges, investment in infrastructure, improving business leadership and management, educating future entrepreneurs, and through cultural and civic engagement – and we’re always ready with the examples to back up those arguments. Our analysis is rooted in a whole-region context for innovation activity, giving us a view of the larger ecosystem in which our universities are operating and the various assets that are available across our networks.

On a practical level, regional university groups can use their convening power to deliver major changes. In Yorkshire and the Humber a legacy of high-carbon emitting industry, threats from flooding, and a series of energy transitions that have affected communities inequitably across the region have generated a consensus on a need not only for decarbonisation, but a green energy agenda infused with social justice. The Yorkshire and Humber Climate Commission, the largest place-based climate commission in the UK acts as a vehicle to mobilise Yorkshire’s universities’ combined research and policy expertise to tackle climate, sustainability and environmental challenges.

Expanding opportunity

Individual institutions have their own widening participation missions and priorities for access, but through collaboration we can expand our collective reach to prospective students and create a much more navigable higher education opportunity landscape for learners. London Higher’s Access HE division is long-established, and is able to create opportunities for targeted programmes of outreach activity to priority groups such as care leavers, and engage in collective advocacy on widening participation funding.

London Higher’s recent acquisition, redesign and relaunch of the Study London campaign is equally helping to drive international education exports to both the capital and nation by bringing together London’s higher education sector under one powerful brand to drive growth and opportunities, and maintain London’s competitive advantage on the global stage.

As in other parts of the country, universities in London and Yorkshire have much to contribute to interventions and investments that match needs of their localities. While London’s universities have deep local roots, a large number of the capital’s institutions are inherently global, with the ability to leverage international connections to attract and retain major foreign direct investment. However, the funding and talent that arrives in London does not only benefit the London region but generates wider impacts right across the country.

Similarly, Yorkshire’s universities have global connections that transcend regional boundaries. In the case of Sheffield Hallam and York St John, some institutions are also forging a physical presence in the capital, making them key players in creating, nurturing and retaining talent and driving international trade and investment. The powerful reputations of London’s and Yorkshire’s universities are therefore vital to delivering on national and sub-national growth agendas.

Wherever the region, and whatever its strengths, regional university groups are going to be key under this government in delivering the devolution deals each part of the country needs.

The article was originally published in Wonkhe, the home of the UK higher education debate

The relationship between policymaking and research: How it works (sometimes)

This blog by Alice Rubbra, an officer of South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority, follows a discussion between herself and Y-PERN Policy Fellows on how research can translate into policy development and delivery.

­­­If you were asked how academic research influences policymaking in government bodies, you might imagine a clear line of knowledge transfer from the researcher developing their proposal and conclusions to the policymaker then taking and building this knowledge into policy and programme design, delivery, and evaluation.

Alice Rubbra, Head of Growth & Skills Policy, SYMCA

Theory – so it goes – never fully aligns to reality.

But that does not always mean policymakers and researchers alike are simply failing to live up to an ideal. It may also be that we underplay the range of ways in which research can influence and strengthen public service.

Good or bad, these are three of the ways in which I’ve seen academic research intersect with policymaking:

1.      Loaning a skillset

The interaction between a policymaker and a researcher does not need to be limited to the transfer of their research into programme design. Often researchers have a skillset which can itself be transplanted into a public organisation, as seen through the seconding of YPERN policy fellows into Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs).

This is particularly helpful for public organisations which are growing or transforming – such as MCAs – and are building capability in a certain area such as data analysis. The loaning or seconding of researchers allows organisations to access a skillset that they need more of, whilst also providing the secondee first-hand experience as to how policy is designed and delivered.

2.      Knowledge-sharing not specific to a policy/programme

It is rare that you can draw a clean line between a research paper and a subsequent policy. The impact of research is often much subtler and more implicit. It is often reliant on the researcher building a working relationship and trust with policymakers.

After all, this is about the transfer of knowledge between people and people often look for signals – such as the reception of previous work and scope of their professional network – for whether to engage with a research proposal.

The role X (formerly Twitter) has played in moving pro-development attitudes from sideline groups into mainstream political discussions is a great example of the snowball effect of researchers engaging with other researchers, think tankers, political staffers etc. all building consensus on policy proposals.

Platforms or fora which deepen connections between policymakers and researchers – and remove barriers to engagement by encouraging any knowledge shared to be accessible and applicable to real life policy problems – increase the chance of researchers building ideas into public service improvement.

However, there is an obvious, glaring flaw in this being an implicit but important way in which research influences policymaking. It is reliant on people building relationships and people have biases, blind spots, and egos.

Whilst these platforms and fora are critical to knowledge transfer, it is important for policymakers to reflect on where they are obtaining knowledge from. If they see consensus building around certain policy ideas, challenge where this has come from and what the underpinning biases and blind spots are.

Creating structured processes, through which policymakers are incentivised to reach out to a more diverse academic community, could also offset some of the risk of more subtle, implicit methods of influencing.

3.      Directly shaping policies and programmes

Of course, the theory does sometimes play out. Researchers are asked to help design and then implement and evaluate policies and programmes. A line is drawn between a proposal and then what is delivered.

But it is hard to judge when this will happen and how this will happen.

The political cycle, the fiscal cycle and just the daily cycle of ‘events’ mean policymakers can start and stop engagement, ideas might not make it to the finish line of delivery or there may be sensitivities around what they can engage researchers on, when.

When researchers are engaged, the policy or programme might be far down the development line towards delivery with the politician or organisation head having already agreed the outcomes of the project. The researcher must therefore work within a framework that has already been set.

This is where I’ve seen some researchers struggle, as the instinct can be to go back and retest the root cause or principles driving the policy and the policymakers are moving on to designing and delivering a service within the framework given. Similarly, lack of understanding of how policy is delivered (how funding decisions are signed off, how legal teams are engaged etc.) can also trip up researchers in effectively engaging policymakers and vice versa.

Where researchers are cognisant of the big P and little p politics surrounding policy design and delivery, where they understand the constraints (and opportunities) they are working within, then there is greater chance for effective working to improve public service. Again, loaning or seconding of researchers into organisations can go some way to meeting this challenge. As well as using platforms to share their ideas, researchers should also see this as their opportunity to obtain information about organisational priorities and governance which will help build understanding of how policy gets designed and implemented.

Concluding reflections

When it comes to influencing policy, it is hard to be purist. Ideas do not seamlessly slip off bookshelves and into programme design. But that’s not to say knowledge transfer between academic research and organisations overseeing public policy is a lost cause. Rather, academic researchers and policymakers should be aware of the whole playbook available to share and implement ideas on public service improvement whether through direct (secondments, loans or advising on a policy/programme) or indirect engagement (sharing ideas through platforms or fora). This includes being aware of the drawbacks of each approach and what it means to do each well.


Alice is currently Head of Growth and Skills Policy at South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority. Her background is in skills and labour market policy, having previously worked for the Department for Education and HM Treasury. She also sits on the Y-PERN Strategic Advisory Board.

The Labour Government, the King’s Speech and a new path to devolution?

The new Government’s plans for English devolution are rightly ambitious, but important questions remain and more consideration should be given to the whole picture of sub-national governance and the role of local government in it – argue Y-PERN Policy Fellow Dr Neil Barnett (Leeds Beckett University) and Paul Hayes, Senior Policy Engagement Fellow at Leeds University Business School.

The incoming Labour Government has wasted no time setting out its intentions for the Devolution agenda in England. Notably, in an early and much-publicised meeting at No. 10, Keir Starmer and Angela Rayner met with the twelve elected Metro Mayors in England to outline the intention to deepen their responsibilities, give them more financial flexibility, particularly for economic development, transport, skills and housing, and to establish a new relationship of central-mayoral partnership. This has been hailed as a significant change in the relationship to one in which Mayors considered they had been ‘talked down to’ by previous administrations. The new Government clearly see sub-national devolution as key to driving its growth agenda, with new responsibilities over spatial planning mooted, along with a requirement to produce Local Growth Plans.

Quickly following the meeting, Angela Rayner wrote to all areas she labelled as ‘devolution deserts’ (e.g. Hampshire) not yet covered by a devolution deal to, essentially, ‘get a move on’. Following this, the King’s Speech outlined an English Devolution Bill which will set out a new, standardised, Devolution Framework with devolution as the ‘default setting’.

“The Government in Whitehall is overloaded, and as a result people in the regions grow increasingly impatient about the decisions being made in London which they know could be better made locally. Under our new style of government, we will devolve government power so that more decisions are made locally.
We will bring forward a sensible measure of local government reform which will involve a genuine devolution of power from the central government.”

1970, Conservative Party Election Manifesto – ‘A better tomorrow’

An end to bartering behind closed doors?

There is much to be welcomed here. The detail of the new Devolution Framework remains to be seen, but it offers an alternative to the bartering, often ‘behind closed doors’, of deal-making with individual areas, which has been the case so far, and has been based on an opaque and piecemeal process seemingly without underlying principles. It is not yet clear whether this is intended to fully replace the ‘Tiered’ approach to Devolution (with four levels of powers) introduced by Michael Gove (former Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities); but it does seem likely that, as of now, differing places will find themselves with differing powers.

With respect to Yorkshire, it remains to be seen if there will be a ‘levelling up’ of the  Combined Authorities (CAs), to give a more congruent set of responsibilities within and across the Region. Another issue is the current status of the Devolution Deal for a Hull and East Riding Mayoral Combined Authority, agreed with Gove, but yet to be confirmed.

Remaining questions: how will power be bestowed?

There are, however, other questions, which remain. The Prime Minister has spoken about new ‘powers’ for Metro Mayors, but it is unclear as to what this means in practice at this stage. For example, will Mayors, and CA’s get new statutory duties, or will they get more responsibility for allocating resources and funding, as is the case now. Will the new ‘powers’, be allocated to Mayors as elected officeholders, or go to the Combined Authorities collectively? Early indications seem to be that the Government is keen to ‘streamline’ decision-making by extending the powers of Mayors and allowing for majority voting in Combined Authority decision-making. This, however, has the potential to bring to the fore competing claims for democratic legitimacy between Mayors and constituent local authority leaders.

Remaining questions: the role of local authorities

Secondly, the focus of the devolution discourse, so far, has been on Mayors and CAs. There has been little mention of devolution to local authorities, but it is local government that provides the foundational services which must underpin any attempt to ‘kickstart’ economic growth. Angela Rayner has recently recognised this, and promised longer-term and more flexible funding settlements, and an end to competitive bidding for pots of funding (what one Council Leader referred to as ‘knobbly knees contests’). Councils will, however, continue to face severe financial constraint, at least in the medium-term, but as it stands it is unclear where (or if at all) they fit in the ‘Devolution Revolution’, and some fear that local government powers may actually be ‘sucked upwards’. Several areas have been unable, or unwilling, to secure agreement on the necessary combinations of councils necessary to be granted a Devolution Deal. The Government, however, is seemingly intent on getting more areas into the devolution fold by September this year. Not only does this seem overly ambitious, but paradoxical in the sense that the whole direction of travel is supposed to be based on enhancing local voice.

Moreover, the agenda also seems to continue the focus set in train by the previous government; devolution will be agreed between government and the ‘top level’ unitary or county local authorities (Angela Rayner’s letter was addressed to the leaders of these councils) with the remaining District Councils in county areas only considered as consultees.

We are likely to see a continuation of an inexorable move towards large, unitary, county councils in a ‘streamlining’ of the system, completing a re-organisation of English local government, which has proceeded incrementally and almost by stealth over the past two decades. This is despite clear evidence of the service or financial benefits of moving to larger councils, let alone the implications for local democracy.

The new Government’s intention to waste no time and move quickly to deliver growth, and its focus on delivery, are understandable, and, given this context, stepping back to raise the issue of wider local government structures may seem somewhat obtuse. However, more time and consideration should be given to the whole picture of sub-national governance and the role of local government in it.

Remaining questions: what’s the best approach for delivery?

Finally, the new Government’s ambitions are rightly and necessarily ambitious. A new approach based on partnership and outcomes has been signalled. The focus is on delivery and ‘what works’. Here, necessary conditions have been highlighted – the need for ‘joined-up’ government, and for a mission-driven approach, for example. Those of a certain age (like the authors) will remember these phrases as central to the Blair Government’s ‘modernisation’ agenda for public services and indeed New Labour’s ‘Third Way’. Moreover, localism and handing down power from Whitehall played a big part in the Coalition Government’s rhetoric after 2010. In the case of New Labour, the result, in reality, was an intensification of central control via hundreds of performance indicators; the Coalition Government passed the Localism Act 2012, which fell far short of the rhetoric, and the subsequent years were also dominated by austerity and intense financial control.

This is not to say that all governments disappoint, but to point out the scale of the task if Labour are to re-set central-local relations and, in doing so, achieve the long-pursued and seemingly elusive ambition of changing civil service culture and the desire of Ministers to keep close oversight for things over which they will be expected to assume public scrutiny.

The process of learning from evidence, then, should include learning from the difficulties previously experienced in striving for ‘joined-up’ approaches, for example, and from areas where there might have been signs of success. One initiative worth re-examining, for example, which ticks the boxes of localism, joined up working and a focus on outcomes and missions, would be place-based budgeting (aka ‘Total Place’), which was piloted during the Brown administration, but not built on after 2010.

It may also be worth re-examining proposals around what Hazel Blears (former Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government) described in 2007 as ‘devolution to the doorstep’. What powers should be devolved down to local council level, and potentially below? Freedoms to bring in local private landlord licensing without central approval immediately come to mind, and there will be other localist ideas that councils may want to push Angela Rayner for.  The new Government’s intended new path gives fresh hope for that such initiatives can be brought back into the debate.

New forum to strengthen glue between South Yorkshire policymakers, academics & others

In this blog, Y-PERN Policy Fellow Dr Dan Olner reflects on the launch of a new forum linking South Yorkshire policymakers, academics and other organisations – with the first session focused on alternative approaches to urban economic development.

In February, colleagues from Y-PERN and SYMCA held our first experimental session of a new forum linking South Yorkshire policymakers, academics and other organisations – we want it to be a place where policy colleagues can network and chat informally about current ideas with topic experts, and where the universities can gain a greater insight into policymakers’ key priorities. [If you’re interested in joining the mailing list to hear about future forums, email d.olner at sheffield.ac.uk].

In the first session, Dr. Richard Crisp discussed a paper he co-authored titled “‘Beyond GDP’ in cities: Assessing alternative approaches to urban economic development” – and follow on work examining how these ideas are doing on the ground. (He’s written a summary blog post here for the Y-PERN blog.)

The five approaches the paper examines are:

  • Inclusive growth: asking ‘who benefits from growth’, what good growth looks like and what structures can aid it.
  • The wellbeing economy: this focuses on what the good life looks like, and what economic benefits flow from that.
  • Doughnut economics has a well developed diagnostic tool (the doughnut) used to guide policy thinking toward staying within planetary boundaries.
  • Community wealth building challenges extractive models of growth – Preston has been the poster child for that, starting its work through procurement and building on it.
  • Foundational economy: possibly the newest framework here, and least tested in the wild. It emerged as a critique of traditional GDP/GVA approaches that, quoting from the paper, “neglect the 40% of the workforce engaged with providing basic goods and services, upon which wellbeing and ‘civilised life’ depends”.

The next phase of Richard and others’ work asks how these alternative approaches are being understood and used. Each are in the UK devolution mixing bowl – however, central government is largely not engaging. Other national governments are. Wales has the Wellbeing of Future Generations Act and work on the foundational economy, Scotland has wellbeing built into its National Performance Framework and tools to support its implementation.

English examples exist, however. Doncaster’s economic strategy 2030 was discussed – a blend of ideas with a great deal about community wealth building, how to use land and assets and bolstering local supply chains. (Elsewhere for the JRF, Simon Duffy also notes Doncaster’s People Focused Group, which he says “has generated social value worth millions of pounds, and has made itself central to the strategies of health and social care”.)

This pick and mix approach appears to be quite common, from conversations the project has had: organisations say they don’t use the terms in the bullet points above explicitly but source ideas from them where useful. This is not without issues. There are so many approaches it’s causing confusion. Some find the language quite alien; others worry that their use might sideline traditional social agendas.

Drivers leading to growth in uptake of these ideas, the project has found, include being in crisis management bought about through austerity – a search for ideas that can ameloriate its worst impacts, and perhaps offer positive change. Devolution is itself triggering a wide search for ideas that can be locally applied, and this is helping to align vision and action across local authorities and regions. There are obstacles as well, coming from the same sources: there are very limited levers given the current devolution funding settlement, and zero financial slack anywhere else.

Richard concluded by noting that, while the plurality of approaches may be causing confusion, they are nevertheless driving change – including how academia and policymaking link, by taking economic development a little way out of traditional economic departments.

The rest of the session knocked all this about between policymakers, academics and other organisations involved in growth ideas. We focused on how the diverse range of economic ideas we’d covered works (or doesn’t) at a local level. Here’s an attempt at a summary of the themes that came up.

  • Most obviously, the meaning and use of the term ‘growth’. How do we use it in practice? SYMCA has already developed a ‘good growth’ idea in its Strategic Economic Plan in 2021 (opens PDF) and carried that through into its recent Good Growth and Skills Strategies.
  • How is growth at the regional and local level different to the national and international level? Models of growth, and actions needed, could be very different (though different levels are of course interlinked). This is perhaps a good way to frame it, rather than “traditional versus alternative”. What works here? Local and regional growth policy is able to tie elements together that matter here: how housing links to transport to business to health to wealth. It’s also possible at this level for ideas to percolate quickly through to action, e.g. a recent doughnut economics event led directly to South Yorkshire retrofit policy.
  • The gap between local and national treasury views show up in different ways. For example, there’s a tension between creating our own economic vision versus the need to have ‘line of sight’ to central government, and policies (e.g. investment plans) pre-designed and on the shelf for when central government announces pots of funding (often with very short application times). This can create a need to follow the grooves of central government thinking, which can leave less room for alternative ideas.
  • Beyond specific policy levers and funding pots, institutional culture and soft power are important, and central to asking, “What do we value?” This is the foundation for asking: how do we measure what we value? How do all the moving parts interconnect (see below)? Language is key – not only finding language to include people policy affects, but also those policymakers may not be versed in terms and ideas used. There’s work to be done here – but good examples exist, e.g. the Welsh Future Generations Act did exactly that that, working to clearly communicate the policy agenda (including a culture change manual).
  • How to understand, measure and change the whole ‘ecosystem’ of interconnecting factors that make up the whole bag of alternative growth ideas (as well as more traditional)? For example growth, climate and health all interact – how to future proof the region so that the economy contributes to a stable climate, necessary for solid health outcomes? Easy question to state…!
  • Many inclusive economy ideas challenge ownership of policy, and push for connection to people affected by those policies. There are e.g. civic square approaches (see e.g. Liverpool civic data coop). Many alternative policies by their nature address power barriers – see for example…
  • The Preston model again. It started with procurement – i.e. it didn’t begin with a strategy document, but acted as a focal point around which other actions could build and, by its nature, addressed issues of value extraction, community wealth building and ownership.
  • The point of devolution is to bring policy closer to the people it affects, and allow it to be shaped by them. This fits with shifting the dial to much more human-centric, bottom up approaches, and leads to different questions. For example, one participant asked: “There are 76000 people long term sick and economically inactive in the region. How does any of this speak to them?” How should this affect e.g. commitments around homelessness and health?

The next forum (probably in May) will likely focus on some aspect of skills. Do get in touch if you have questions about that, want to join the mailing list, or have any reflections on the above – at d.olner at sheffield.ac.uk.

Y-PERN Briefing Note: What can we learn from the international evidence on devolution? 

In this briefing, Dr Neil Barnett (Y-PERN Policy Fellow for Yorkshire & Humber Councils) takes a broad look at the international trend towards devolving powers to regions and the evidence for its overall benefit.

In recent decades, there has been an international trend towards devolving powers or duties to sub-national tiers of government as best practice, promoted by a range of bodies such as the IMF, World Bank, and OECD, the EU, and influential think tanks.

The review of evidence reveals a number of key themes which shape current understanding of devolution to regional and sub-regional bodies. These include whether it ‘works’, what are its diverse effects, how we can capture and understand its beneficial outcomes (both in economic terms and the well-being of citizens), and does it enhance democracy?  

Our review indicates that the evidence reviewed is contradictory, and is based on differing methodological approaches and focus. This means a definitive answer to each of the questions above is not possible, with a more concise answer being – ‘it depends’. The evidence is often circumstantial, meaning it is difficult to establish a firm relationship between any particular scale of governance and outcomes.

Assessing the effects of devolution is thus dependant on a series of questions, including: what form does it take? where and when is it taking place and why? and who is involved and how do they interact? 

Treating international ‘lessons’ with caution 

(1) What is studied differs; sometimes it is regions and sub-regions, which can cover widely differing geographical sizes and populations, and at other times cities or metropolitan areas.

Importantly, a variety of methodologies are applied to different countries, even if selected as ‘similar’ for comparison purposes. Furthermore, ‘similar’ countries such as those across the OECD and the EU have differing constitutional, political, economic and social histories and contemporary contexts. This raises the question; where we are looking and what are the most appropriate international comparator case studies? 

(2) The terminology differs both in terms of how different sub-state geographies are described and the multilevel (re)distribution of governmental powers in different international case studies.

International literature most commonly focuses on decentralisation of administrative, fiscal, and political powers. Pike et. al, provide a helpful ‘sliding scale’ or ‘spectrum’ of decentralisationi

In the UK, the term ‘devolution’ has been attached to the agenda of sub-national re-organisation. The scale of decentralisation is strongly connected to when the UK government has sought to undertake reform.

Since the late 1990s, ‘asymmetric devolution’ has seen full control over a diverse range of policy areas, and some legislative, welfare, and fiscal powers, to the Scottish and Welsh Parliaments and to a lesser extent the Northern Ireland Assembly.

In England, the creation of a piecemeal patchwork of sub-regional Combined Authorities since 2010 is more closely aligned to political decentralisation.

This raises questions as to the overarching intention of decentralisation in the UK and why does the initiative exist? 

(3) Decentralisation, then, occurs to varying degrees in different states (including the UK).

In practice, it is rare for there to be ‘full’ (federal or confederal) devolution, or self-rule; more often we see shared rule. Measuring these varying degrees means that proxy measures of devolved or autonomous powers have to be used. Whilst these have become quite sophisticated (see for example the Local Autonomy Index (LAI)) they inevitably involve some degree of subjectivity. 

(4) In reality, in most states there are several levels of sub-national governance. The specifics of place and geography are key, meaning that ‘lessons’ from other international contexts are limited in value. 

In the UK, devolved sub-state Multi-Level Governance (MLG) systems are highly complex and irregular, and do not function in strict hierarchical, scaler fashion.

For example, Combined Authorities (CAs) in England, interact with local authorities and other organisations at a variety of scales. While each hold some decentralised powers, these are not consistent in their distribution, and CAs are dependent on other levels of government for implementation. Much depends on the actual practices of inter-level relationships, requiring fine grained knowledge not just of formal structures but of informal relationships; highlighting the importance of understanding who is involved, at what level of government, and how they interact.

What do we know? Impacts of decentralisation in different policy areas 

Research on specific policy areas underlines the importance of recognising the caveats outlined above, but we can also find some valuable ‘take-aways’ from reviewing international evidence: 

  1. The Economy: With respect to economic growth, impacts of decentralisation depend on its form, and context and purpose of reform. The relative state of the macro or ‘national’ economy however is key. This noted, once popular assumptions about cities being ‘engines of growth’ have been superseded by place-based ‘polycentric’ approaches which recognise the importance of multi-level institutional arrangements, and wider inter-relationships of cities, towns and rural areas. Moreover, it is clear that the particular combinations of administrative, fiscal and political decentralisation are important in terms of whether they complement each other, or not, in particular places. 
  2. Productivity & Inequality: There is some evidence of positive impacts on productivity of decentralisation to areas with an over-arching geographical co-ordinating capacity, but also a lack of clarity as to what scale this should cover. Contradictory impacts are found on inequality, where degrees of autonomy have been found to increase, and at other times decrease, spatial disparities. Effects on the delivery of a range of public services are similarly mixed.  
  3. Health: Impacts on health have proven hard to isolate from inter-related social, economic and cultural factors, and, as in other policy areas, causality is hard to prove. Again, the importance of context, pre-existing conditions, and complementarities between policy interventions is evident.  
  4. Democracy: There is surprisingly little explicit evidence of the democratic impacts. Intuitively, decentralised units should bring power ‘closer’ to people and stimulate greater democratic engagement and participation. Most evidence refers, though, to local government (i.e., below sub-regional level), and is largely inconclusive. 

Place, Institutional arrangements and ‘quality of governance’ matter. 

Having been presented with a lengthy and complex range of evidence, it is possible to state that ‘the Jury’ is not only out but is most likely confused. Sifting through international evidence is not wholly a frustrating exercise though; there are some broad but clear messages.  

Firstly, although we can’t assign benefits clearly to particular scales, we can state that it is the mix that matters. Decentralisation takes a variety of forms and it is the place-specific complementarities, or disjunctures, which produce positive and negative effects.  

Secondly, ‘place-based’ approaches are necessary but should not been seen to be in strict dichotomy with wider, national, distributional ones. The evidence points implies that decentralisation should take place within a coherent national policy framework (both across England and the UK), with sufficient freedoms and flexibilities at sub-state national level to allow for local knowledge to be utilised and for place-sensitive policies to emerge within an overarching institutional framework. 

Thirdly, following on form this, in all of the policy areas above, it is clear that institutions and the quality of governance are key influences. Both terms have formal definitions but also refer to a wider range of relationship-based practices and networks of interactions. Institutional settings provide the support, legal frameworks, rules, norms and conditions of behaviour of everyday practices which make the complex environment of MLG function or otherwise.  

Getting the right ‘fit’ of these things is dependent on political and cultural settings, along with historical legacies left by previous reforms (as is clear in the complex governance system in Yorkshire, and Humber for example). There is need to also acknowledge that devolution in itself is not a panacea, and its processes and overarching purpose need to be worked at and allowed to evolve with regards to what, where, when, why, who, and how. Reviewing the international literature therefore emphasises a need to focus on practices in actual settings, and towards behaviours and agency of the actors involved in devolution across Yorkshire and Humber. 

Next Steps 

Further briefings on the evolving evidence in the UK and related issues of local governance in the Yorkshire & the Humber region are to follow.  

Photo by Lewis Ashton: https://www.pexels.com/photo/aerial-view-of-the-staithes-harbour-north-yorkshire-england-10413677/

Understanding alternative approaches to regional economic development in Yorkshire & the Humber

The best way approach to regional economic development is still a matter for debate and research, says Dr Richard Crisp from the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) at Sheffield Hallam University.

Enduring social and spatial inequalities are seeing policymakers across Yorkshire and the Humber grapple with new ways of tackling old problems in recent years. The Doncaster Economic Strategy 2030 launched in January 2023, for example, places the wellbeing economy at the heart of its approach, while also nodding to inclusive growth, community wealth building and the foundational economy as guiding frameworks.

Elsewhere, Leeds City Council’s Inclusive Growth Leeds 2023-2030 strategy champions community wealth building through its Leeds Anchors network which encourages some of city’s largest organisations to employ local people and procure local services.

This accelerating interest in ‘alternative’ approaches to economic development shows a new willingness among local policymakers to experiment and innovate to improve the lives of residents and strengthen communities. A key driver is growing concern that longstanding ‘traditional’ approaches such as promoting growth in high-value ‘tradeable’ sectors have done little to tackle disadvantage or reverse environmental degradation.

“Y-PERN will play a key role in exploring how alternative approaches to regional economic development are being adopted and implemented across the region, and what outcomes and impact is being achieved.”

Dr Rich Crisp

The emergence of alternative approaches creates a complex policy space as different frameworks vie for attention or are combined in a ‘pick and mix’ approach. This is particularly the case in England which lacks the strategic national steer provided by the devolved governments in Wales and Scotland.

For example, the Scottish Government’s Programme for Government 2023 to 2024 outlines commitments to a wellbeing economy and community wealth building. Preparations for a Community Wealth Building Bill and a Wellbeing and Sustainable Development (Scotland) Bill are also under way.

How then are we to make sense of these approaches and their deployment in a fragmented landscape of governance in England, with local authorities and combined authorities – where they exist – all doing things differently? What are the distinctive features of these approaches, how they are being put into practice, and what impact are they having?

A team of academics from universities across the UK explored some of these questions in a recent paper which reviews five of the most commonly implemented approaches, as highlighted in the table below.

An overview of five ‘alternative’ approaches to economic development


Our analysis of cornerstone texts and core strategic documents highlights key differences in the visions set out, the mechanisms to drive change, and the geographic scales and challenges the approaches respond to.

Wellbeing economy and doughnut economics are the two approaches which most clearly articulate a vision of the “good life”, often underpinned by an outcomes frameworks to measure progress. In terms of mechanisms for change, there is a common concern for democratic participation, but also marked differences in terms of prescriptiveness with community wealth building offering the most defined set of principles and tools (e.g. progressive procurement and plural ownership of the economy). With respect to geographic scale, there is rarely clarity on the geographic disparities to be addressed (aside from community wealth building), despite the mobilisation of these approaches by many local authorities.

Our paper identifies key gaps in current knowledge. Advocates claim these approaches can generate transformative economic change. However, we still know little about how they are being understood, adopted and implemented in different places. A lack of evaluation also means evidence on the outcomes and impact of initiatives is also scarce.

To address some of these gaps, the research team are undertaking workshops with stakeholders in Sheffield as well as Birmingham, Cardiff, and Glasgow to gain insight into the experiences, challenges and outcomes of deploying alternative approaches. Due to report in Spring 2024, we hope our work sheds some light on this complex and fragmented policy terrain.

That said, the more recent emergence of further alternative approaches in both academic and policy circles such as degrowth or postgrowth, the circular economy and regenerative economies suggests there is little prospect that the current flux will settle anytime soon.

Y-PERN will play a key role in surveying and clarifying this complex policy terrain by working with academic and policy partners to explore how alternative approaches are being adopted and implemented across the region, and what outcomes and impact is being achieved. Y-PERN provides an ideal platform for sharing learning and good practice from across and beyond the region. This will sharpen understanding around the potential for alternative approaches to support more inclusive and sustainable economies and places.

Richard Crisp is a researcher at the Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) at Sheffield Hallam University. He specialises in research on inclusive and sustainable economies, ‘alternative’ approaches to economic development, poverty, worklessness, and social and spatial inequalities.

Reference and credit for full paper referred to in this blog:

Crisp, R., Waite, D., Green, A., Hughes, C., Lupton, R., MacKinnon, D. and Pike, A. (2023) ‘Beyond GDP’ in cities: assessing alternative approaches to urban economic development. Urban Studies, OnlineFirst. Copyright © 2023 (Crisp, R., Waite, D., Green, A., Hughes, C., Lupton, R., MacKinnon, D. and Pike, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00420980231187884

Image by Freepik


Tougher benefit sanctions: another bout of policy amnesia?

The government’s recent ‘Back to Work’ plan is discussed and critiqued in light of the available evidence by Y-PERN Policy Fellow Dr Jamie Redman alongside fellow Sheffield Hallam University colleagues Dr Richard Crisp and Dr Elizabeth Sanderson.

On November 22 2023, following publication of the Autumn Statement, central government outlined the latest plans to improve productivity and strengthen the national economy. These plans converge around several key policy intervention areas, which include building a sustainable domestic energy programme, delivering a world-class education system, reducing public debt, removing barriers to investment, cutting taxes for both businesses and working people, and reforming the social security system to tackle rising levels of health-related economic inactivity[1].

At the crux of government’s strategy to tackle economic inactivity is their latest ‘Back to Work plan’. It comprises a programme of investment in talking therapies and personalised support backed up by a ‘stricter benefit regime’, with greater digital powers conferred to frontline staff for monitoring compliance at jobs fairs/interviews and tougher benefit sanctions, which now include potential loss of access to medical prescriptions for failures to comply with work-related obligations[2].

“Stricter benefit regimes are overwhelmingly harmful, not helpful, to those who are subjected to them”

Jamie Redman, Richard Crisp & Elizabeth Sanderson

There is good evidence that access to personalised support and talking therapies can help those out of work with health conditions to take steps back towards employment[3]. This is critical at a time when levels of economic inactivity due to ill-health are at record levels[4]. However, this works best as part of a voluntary approach where those receiving support are able to build relationships of trust with key workers, and take steps to return to work that do not undermine wellbeing or recovery from health conditions.

This kind of personalised support will be available through the Back to work Plan but, critically, is underpinned by a regime of conditionality and sanctions that is being ratcheted up to ensure compliance with job-search expectations. 

Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Mel Stride says that the Back to Work plan will deliver three outcomes: helping people to “stay healthy”, “move off benefits”, and “move in to work”[5]. Unfortunately, we’ve been here before – several times since the Lloyd George administration ushered in the Genuinely Seeking Work Test in 1921[6]. Previous research on similar rounds of welfare reform – including research conducted internally by DWP[7] – shows that only one of these outcomes usually occurs.

Stricter benefit regimes, including the hidden managerial methods ministers press through Jobcentre Plus to ensure frontline staff administer conditionality and sanctions, are effective at getting claimants to “move off benefits”[8].  They are far less effective at getting people to “move in to work” [9], particularly the secure, well-paid types of jobs conducive to wellbeing. They are wholly ineffective at helping people to “stay healthy”.

The opposite is usually true. Stricter benefit regimes have been found to increase poverty and destitution; exacerbate mental and physical ill health; lead some to engage in ‘survival crime’ or to disengage from support altogether[10]; and have been identified by families of the deceased as a key determinant behind a series of benefit-related deaths and suicides[11].

The message from activists, academics and even some (former) staff within the Department for Work and Pensions is one now repeated beyond exhaustion, but also one that is still ignored by central government – stricter benefit regimes are overwhelmingly harmful, not helpful, to those who are subjected to them. If government are genuinely serious about improving health and employment outcomes of the UK’s most disadvantaged groups, then they could start by acknowledging their own evidence base.


[1] https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/655dbc3d544aea000dfb322d/E02982473_Autumn_Statement_Nov_23_BOOK_PRINT.pdf

[2] HM Treasury (2023) Employment support launched for over a million people. Retrieved from: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/employment-support-launched-for-over-a-million-people

[3] Batty, E, Crisp, R, Gilbertson, J et al. (2022) Working Well Early Help: Final Annual Report 2022. Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research: Sheffield Hallam University.

[4] HoC (2023: 34) Plans for Jobs and employment support. House of Commons Work and Pensions Committee. Retrieved from: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm5803/cmselect/cmworpen/600/report.html

[5] https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-statements/detail/2023-11-16/hcws43

[6] Deacon, A. (1976) In search of the scrounger. Occasional Papers on Social Administration. No.60. London: G. Bell & Sons

[7] DWP (2023) The Impact of Benefit Sanctions on Employment Outcomes. Retrieved from: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-impact-of-benefit-sanctions-on-employment-outcomes-draft-report/the-impact-of-benefit-sanctions-on-employment-outcomes

[8] Loopstra, R., Reeves, A., McKee, M. et al. (2015), Do Punitive Approaches to Unemployment Benefit Recipients Increase Welfare Exit and Employment? Oxford: Department of Sociology; see also Deacon (1976: 9)

[9] DWP (2023); Loopstra et al (2015)

[10] Welfare Conditionality (2018) Final Findings Report 2013-2018. London: ESRC; Batty E, Beatty C, Casey R, et al. (2015) Homeless People’s Experiences of Welfare Conditionality and Benefit Sanctions. London: Crisis.

[11] Deaths by Welfare project: https://healingjusticeldn.org/deaths-by-welfare-project/ https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AMqB2R1gj07IAdBzh_2JQtWbjxCzFMRsevmkf-Dcj04/edit

Image by atlascompany on Freepik

Good Work in the South Yorkshire economy

Against a national rise in low quality work, Y-PERN Policy Fellows Elizabeth Sanderson and Dr Jamie Redman set out an agenda to both investigate and improve job quality in South Yorkshire.

Over the last few decades, the UK has seen a rise in low quality work (Goos and Manning, 2007). These are jobs which are broadly defined as low-skilled, low-paid, insecure and more effort intensive, offering little scope for worker autonomy, task discretion or opportunity for upwards mobility (Shildrick et al., 2012).

Despite the introduction of National Minimum Wage legislation in 1998 and more recent National Living Wage legislation in 2016, incidence of low pay measured as below two thirds of the national median weekly wage has remained stubbornly high at over a quarter of all employees (Cominetti et al., 2022). This is partly owed to the effects of job insecurity on earnings, with workers in the bottom quartile of the wage distribution typically experiencing greater work schedule volatility (Cominetti et al., 2022) and persistently lower employment tenure compared to workers in the upper quartiles (Choonara, 2019).

Despite this, compared to previous decades and across most sectors, UK workers surveyed in the 2010s reported working harder and with less control over how hard to work, what tasks to do and how tasks were to be done (Green et al., 2021).  The Sheffield City region is no exception to the national rise in low quality work. Dubbed ‘Britain’s low pay capital’ (Thomas et al., 2020), poorly remunerated and precarious forms of work are found to be disproportionately concentrated in the Sheffield City regional economy.  

In May 2022, a key feature of the South Yorkshire Mayor’s manifesto was to tackle poor job quality as part of a broader commitment to building ‘a better not just bigger economy’. The South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority have since identified a series of key strategic priorities geared towards addressing issues of job quality and establishing a regional level ‘good work’ agenda. The key strategic priorities for ‘good work’ are as follows: 

  • To establish an evidence base around the future of work in South Yorkshire, including planning for and managing the decline of some sectors and the transition to new sources of employment. 
  • To show and to demonstrate that good work is more than standards and compliance but can drive benefits for all. 
  • To create a movement for change rather than a club that rewards those already providing good work. 
  • To consider where good work practices currently exist and how these businesses can inform and champion a good work agenda more broadly. 
  • To consider the implications and approach for improving job quality among what may be hard to reach businesses.  

Our research team, based at Sheffield Hallam University’s Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research and as part of the Yorkshire Policy Engagement Research Network (Y-PERN), responds directly to the mayor’s call for a regional level job quality intervention. We have developed and will execute a broad four-point agenda which seeks to both investigate and improve job quality in South Yorkshire.  These four points are as follows: 

  1. Build an evidence base. Understanding the issues around job quality, developing scenarios for change and learning from what has been developed elsewhere. 
  2. Deliver good work trials/demonstration projects. Through a mix of pilots and observational studies of existing practices we will demonstrate how new approaches to good work can operate in the workplace with benefits for all key stakeholders. 
  3. Build a movement for change. With engagement, involvement and leadership of business, intermediaries, workers and citizens, we will define and drive a good work agenda in South Yorkshire. 
  4. Draw lessons for influencing policy. We will identify calls to action for a future devolution settlement for South Yorkshire while ensuring that good work practices identified and developed in the Sheffield City Region are available to influence policy and practice across other regions of the UK. 

Reference list 

Choonara, J. (2019) Insecurity, Precarious Work and Labour Markets: Challenging the Orthodoxy. London: Palgrave Macmillan.  

Cominetti, Costa, R, Datta N and Odamtten, F. (2022) Low Pay Britain 2022: Low pay and insecurity in the UK labour market. Resolution Foundation.  

Goos, M., & Manning, A. (2007). Lousy and Lovely Jobs: The Rising Polarization of Work in Britain. The Review of Economics and Statistics, 89(1), 118–133.  

Green, F., Felstead, A., Gallie, D., & Henseke, G. (2022). Working Still Harder. ILR Review, 75(2), 458–487. https://doi.org/10.1177/0019793920977850 

Shildrick., T., MacDonald, R., Webster, C., and Garthwaite, K. (2012) Poverty and Insecurity: Life in Low-Pay, No-Pay Britain. Bristol: Policy Press. 

Thomas, P., Etherington, D., Jeffery, B., Beresford, R., Beel, D., Jones, M. (2020), Tackling Labour Market Injustice and Organising Workers: The View from a Northern Heartland. Report downloaded from the internet on 27th March 2023: https://sheffieldtuc.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/SNAP-report-Tackling-Labour-Market-Injustice-and-Organising-Workers-The-View-form-a-Northern-Heartland.pdf