Greater Manchester to 'earn back' up to £30m a year of tax

Greater Manchester has agreed a deal with Whitehall that will see the city region given the chance to ‘earn back’ up to £30m a year of tax for the growth it creates through investing in infrastructure.

Under the so-called ‘city deal’, the ten councils that comprise Greater Manchester will invest £1.2 billion in improving infrastructure, such as transport, will be permitted to recoup up to £30m a year of national tax revenues it creates through growth.

The innovation will be set up through a revolving Infrastructure Fund with a proportion of the national tax take returned to the city region on a payment-by-results basis.

Greater Manchester said the plan could lead to 3,800 new jobs for local people and will protect 2,300 existing jobs.

The ‘city deal’ is the second announced after that agreed with Liverpool earlier this year that could see Merseyside benefit from a £130m investment.

Cities Minister Greg Clark said: “We’ve said to each City ‘make us an offer’. Tell us how you can drive growth in ways that have not been tried before, or which harness your city’s unique strengths in new ways. Manchester has risen to that challenge with style.

“For our whole nation to prosper our cities must also unlock the potential of all of the citizens within them.

“I am especially pleased that this ‘deal’ includes the truly innovative ‘earn back’ model which allows Manchester to reinvest the benefits of its own entrepreneurship. This is just the kind of ground breaking response that we are keen to encourage.”

Other elements of the ‘city deal’ include:

• establishing a Greater Manchester Investment Framework aimed at making the best use of funding from central government, European funding, and private sector funding to drive economic growth. Investment will be prioritised on the basis of Gross Value Added and jobs per pound of public funding
• establishing a Low Carbon Hub to integrate multiple carbon reduction measures. The Department of  Energy and Climate Change will support Greater Manchester to achieve a 48% carbon reduction target by 2020
• establishing Greater Manchester Housing Investment Board to set up an investment fund, to drive the building of 5,000-7,000 new homes by 2017
• Commit Government and Greater Manchester to work together to deliver improved transport services by devolving the Northern franchises bus improvement, including the devolution of central subsidies and smart ticketing
• strengthening Greater Manchester’s Business Growth Hub which gives trade, investment and business advice to local companies, with government contributing £4.4m of transitional funding, prior to local funding from Enterprise Zone revenues coming on-stream from 2015
• developing Greater Manchester’s role as a beacon for high value inward investment, particularly developing markets in China, India and Graphene technologies
• creating a City Apprenticeship and Skills Hub to increase the number of apprenticeships for 16-24 year olds by 10% to 6,000 by channelling funding direct to employers, in particular small and medium sized businesses