More than five million people live in the West Midlands region, an area that encompasses major urban centres of the Black Country, Birmingham and Coventry, and small rural communities such as those in Herefordshire and Shropshire. It is home to traditional manufacturing and agricultural industries as well as emerging business sectors. It is important that this region is represented at a national level, as well as in Europe.

The West Midlands Regional Assembly is a nominated body representing a wide range of civic and business interests. The assembly has 100 voting members, including 68 local authority representatives, 16 business representatives and 16 representatives of other groups including health, housing, trades unions, cultural, ethnic and faith communities.

The year 2005-06 will be the seventh year that the West Midlands Regional Assembly has operated. The past two years in particular have seen the rapid development of all the English regional assemblies, and the West Midlands Regional Assembly has been no exception.

Following last year’s referendum in the North East region, the government has stated that it will not be promoting directly elected regional assemblies in England in the foreseeable future. In fact, West Midlands Regional Assembly has consistently held the view that this path was not necessarily the right one for all regions.

Despite the ‘no’ vote in the North East, the West Midlands Regional Assembly will continue its proven partnership model, linking the work of national and local government and regional partners on a range of strategic issues.

The positive outcome from these recent events is that there is now clarity on the assembly’s role, namely as the regional planning body, delivering public scrutiny of the regional development agency, Advantage West Midlands, and co-ordinating policies and strategies at the regional level.

The assembly welcomes the additional devolved responsibilities being proposed for regional assemblies, such as the Regional Housing Board. Regional assemblies, representing the broad interests of each region, are the appropriate structures to perform such roles. However, additional workload and responsibilities must be backed by a commensurate increase in resources, if delivery is to be effective in these areas.

This year will, in the main, be a year of building on the foundations that have been established over the last three years. The assembly is in the middle of implementing the far-reaching West Midlands Spatial Strategy. It is also promoting the new Regional Sustainable Development Framework, and the Regional Economic Strategy.

The West Midlands Regional Assembly is very positive about the opportunities in the DevolvingDecision Making consultation. This document has been issued by HM Treasury, the Departments for Transport and Trade and Industry and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, to discuss regional funding allocations.

The assembly’s response sets out the case for strengthening the capacity of regional institutions to meet the specific economic and social challenges. It also sets out proposals to improve decision-making by establishing clearer assumptions on funding for regional transport, housing and economic development. The view is that this would be another step in devolving greater decision-making to the regions.

Broadly, the view from the West Midlands Regional Assembly is that while further political devolution to regional level is not now likely – indeed, the debate has proved something of a distraction – a further devolution of decision-making to regional level, and greater control of important areas of public sector financing at regional level, can only be good things.