The Towns Fund board, called #StrongerHereford, is made up of local leaders, businesses and communities who have put forward a bid for £25 million to Central Government.
The Rt Hon Jesse Norman holds one of the 15 places on the #StrongerHereford board. Jesse has been a Member of Parliament for Hereford and South Herefordshire since 2010 and is Financial Secretary to the Treasury.
Collaboration and a common vision has remained integral to the board but as Jesse explains:
“It’s an incredibly difficult task to capture the essence of the city somehow, and yet retain its energy and life. Like trying to bottle a rainbow.”
That’s why our bid was developed by an independent private and voluntary sector-led board but alongside the local council and leaders.
Jesse explains:
“It had to be built up from the grass roots. Drawing together private, volunteer and private sector energy, non-partisan, not political, consensual, distinctive and long term”.
It certainly was a huge amount of work and involved an immense amount of local consultation but the board with its very different backgrounds, interests and experience brought together a bid which Jesse says “is distinctive, so you knew which the city was without needing to check”.
The result is a very coherent and strategic long term plan for future investment.
“It combines skills, enterprise, heritage, culture, the arts, tourism into a package emphasising creativity, sustainability, connectivity and fairness.”
With the Budget 2021 already announcing £1bn for 45 areas of England, we now wait until May for the results of our Town Investment Plan.