The new Sussex and Brighton Strategic Authority board held its first AGM yesterday (Wednesday 1 July) and said that, as a result, it had unlocked £117 million of government funding to be spent over the next four years.
The board, which covers Brighton and Hove and West Sussex and East Sussex, met in Crawley, and discussed the strategic authority’s financial plan for the next four years.
Formed in April as part of the government’s devolution process – a transfer of some powers and budgets to local government – the board is also preparing for the election of the first mayor of the county in May 2028.
The government has allocated £1.14 billion to the strategic authority over the next 30 years. The initial £117 million comes from that pot.
The board includes two representatives each from Brighton and Hove City Council, West Sussex County Council, and East Sussex County Council.
Until the mayor is elected, a representative of the three councils will take turns – eight months each – to chair the strategic authority.
The first chair was chosen yesterday – Councillor Bella Sankey, the Labour leader of Brighton and Hove City Council – and she said that it was a privilege.
She said: “For the first time, the three places that make up Sussex – Brighton and Hove, East Sussex and West Sussex – are sitting around the same table, with a shared mandate and a shared ambition for the future of the place we all call home.
“This is an historic and exciting moment for Sussex. I am pleased to be sitting here today with the new leadership in East and West Sussex and share with them the daunting but exciting opportunity of bringing greater prosperity and investment to our area.”
Councillor Sankey said that she was “genuinely proud” of what the strategic authority had achieved in the few months since it was formed.
She added that the £117 million would be spent “tackling the most persistent issues across Sussex and generating opportunities for everyone who lives here”.
As well as looking at the strategic authority’s medium-term financial plan – covering this year and the next three financial years – the board discussed work on a “prosperity strategy” to guide some of its most important decisions. The strategy will be drawn up over the coming year.
Councillor Sankey said: “The prosperity strategy is the key to attracting investment.
“Its priorities will mean we can work with national and international businesses who want to be part of what Sussex has to offer: brilliant national and international connectivity, a wealth of local talent and three universities producing the skilled people our employers need.
“And, above all, it commits us to securing good jobs for the people who live here – jobs with security and progression, with the kind of graduate and apprenticeship schemes that mean a young person in Hastings or Bexhill has the same chance as one in Crawley or Brighton to build their future where they grew up. Not even London can say that.”
Well that neatly sidesteps the risk of losing the May 2027 local elections. Meanwhile it’s high time Ms Sankey shared her 20% resident satisfaction rating with the rest of Sussex and spread the joy around.
Why ?
Her membership of the Strategic Authority is predicated on (a) being an elected B&HCC councillor and (b) being appointed to it by the Council after the 2027 elections.
Membership isn’t for life!
Tell that to the 2 Tories from each of West and East Sussex County Councils who were replaced by Reform and Lib Dems respectively following last May’s county council elections.
My maths makes that figure divide to around £9.75 million per local authority area per year over the 4 years they have to spend it.
Yet Brighton and Hove City Council has a projected budget shortfall of nearly £40million for the 2026/27. Labour councillors can pretend all they like that we are not living through Labour austerity and the continuation of Tory cuts to council budgets, but the fact that the council is closing libraries, day centres for people with learning disabilities and doesn’t have enough money to fill potholes, says it all really.
All this moving money around from different pots and self-congratulatory back patting isn’t fooling anyone really is it?
100% Cathy B. Labour can slag off the Tories as much as they like but they are proving even worse and doing damage the Tories never dreamed of re closing down desperately needed public facilities in the city. This £117m is not Bella Sankey’s personal money pot to fill in a BH debt black hole and needs to last and be spent on county-wide needs long after she’s gone. I bet it makes her day she has to work with Reform Councillors on devolution now. If she really believed her own propaganda that Reform are far-right and hate-spreading, she would be resigning as a matter of principle.
Where does it say that the 117m would be used as a personal pot by Bella Sankey? It’s very clear in the article that she says the money is to be used “tackling the most persistent issues across Sussex and generating opportunities for everyone who lives here”. Do you ever read the articles or just dive right in after glancing at the headline?
Members of the SA will have to work with each other and from 2028 the elected mayor as well.
The Tory Tees Valley has to work with 5 Labour leaders from each of the councils in the area yet things are getting done.
The Reform Mayor of East Yorkshire has to work with 2 Tories and 2 Lib Dems
Mayors across the country from all political parties have to work with council leaders from all political parties.
They may do it with gritted teeth but they need to make it work.
Plus if Cllr Sankey resigned she’s just be replaced by another B&HCC Labour Councillor or would you rather B&H didn’t have any representation on the SA?
What track record does this group, chaired by Bella Sankey, of making wise investments and working for successful, profitable businesses?
Or will the £117m be used for more cycle lanes and promoting active travel? 🤔
We probably do need more cycle lanes and less fat baby boomers driving half a mile for a pint of milk.
Please for the love of God, keep Trevor Muten away from it otherwise we’ll have a cycle flyover along Valley Hardens and the Seafront…