Making Northampton ‘digital’ with a ’21st century town centre’ forms part of new economic growth strategy

Memebers of Northampton Borough Council’s cabinet agreed the strategy last Wednesday (May 20), updating a previous strategy that was dated from 2008.

It comes up with nine key priorities in a bid to drive growth across the town. The priorities include creating a ’21st century town centre’ and continuing with the Waterside Enterprise Zone; increasing tourism numbers into the borough by promoting the cultural and heritage sector; making Northampton a ‘digital town’ by ensuring that everyone has access to high quality digital connectivity; and improving transport and green infrastructure but also modernising and improving health services and community facilities.

Speaking about the strategy, Councillor Tim Hadland, cabinet member for regeneration, said: “This is a meaty piece of work bringing up to date our strategy from way back in 2008. It has a list of headings such as promoting the assets that make us a cut above similar towns in the area. We’ve always rather hid ourselves under a hedge and we need to be more aggressive in the way we promote ourselves, sing about our successes and trumpet our opportunities.

“We need to make sure that we have employers right at the heart of the skills system to make sure that the skills programmes we put in place produce the employees we need to take the economy forward. And there’s tremendous work to be done with infrastructure which we’re all well aware of.”

Other priorities within the strategy include developing a programme of support to six key sectors: creative and cultural industries, advanced manufacturing, financial services, logistics, health and wellbeing and retail.

It also suggests developing a skills programme to bridge the gap between employers and education providers, and developing programmes and projects that ensure the local economy ‘offers the conditions for businesses to thrive’. It also wants to retain more people in the borough.

The report states: “Northampton lags behind other comparator areas in terms of educational attainment levels, from early years to secondary schools. Office for National Statistics analysis also reveals that Northampton is currently eight per cent less productive than the national average and the average weekly wage is lower than our neighbours in West Northamptonshire.”

The final strand of the strategy focuses on the borough council’s commitment to make Northampton ‘a zero carbon, zero waste and climate resilient town’ by 2030.

Labour leader Councillor Danielle Stone welcomed much of the report, but lamented that certain communities within the town had, in her view, not been given ample opportunity to comment on or feed into the strategy.

She said: “Northampton has got more and more diverse over the years I’ve lived here, and wonderfully so. Each community brings different cultural traditions, different food, different ways of behaviour and different things to contribute. You would never guess that from reading this report.

“I think we’re missing a trick. If we’re going to regenerate and give ourselves a sound economic package we need to look at the people in our town as a resource. We need to have a language policy and to engage with the community, and they should have been consulted about this strategy.”

Responding to her comments, Councillor Hadland replied: “As far as sections of the community that Councillor Stone may feel are left out, this is for the whole economy of the whole of Northampton without any fear or favour and that is the way it has been constructed and will be the way it is taken forward.”