What are the powers of the West Midlands mayor and combined authority?

The powers and responsibilities of the WMCA and metro mayor are focused on economic functions, including transport, adult skills, infrastructure, housing and business support.

The WMCA controls a consolidated, devolved transport budget, the local roads network, and has the power to introduce bus franchising. It is also responsible for the 19+ adult education budget, used to fund a range of training and skills programmes.

The WMCA works with constituent and non-constituent members on spatial planning and redevelopment of brownfield land, including by using compulsory purchasing powers to acquire land. However, formal planning powers rest primarily with individual local councils.

The WMCA controls a 30-year capital investment fund of £8 billion, subject to five-yearly reviews, which is invested in transport projects and other capital programs to increase regional productivity and growth.

The metro mayor has few executive powers that he can exercise unilaterally. In most cases, decisions of the WMCA must be approved by either a majority or two thirds of the WMCA members.

The West Midlands agreed a ‘trailblazer’ devolution deal with the government in March 2023, as did Greater Manchester. Once implemented, this deal will give WMCA further powers over post-19 skills, housing and regeneration, transport, and net zero.

The trailblazer deal will also reform WMCA’s funding model to treat it more like a government department, giving the combined authority more autonomy. Several funding streams will be consolidated into a single, non-ringfenced, settlement for each spending review period. In exchange, WMCA and the government will agree a “streamlined, overarching single accountability process” with specific outcomes for WMCA to achieve over each spending review period.

What is the WMCA’s budget?

In February 2024, WMCA agreed a balanced budget of £1.2bn for the 2024/25 financial year, split between £707m capital expenditure and a £507m revenue budget, for day-to-day spending.

A total of £582m (82%) of the planned capital budget is allocated to transport investments, including both WMCA-delivered projects and local authority projects supported by grants from the combined authority. Housing and regeneration (£95m) accounts for most of the rest of the planned capital spending. 

The largest source of capital funding is central government grants, including the City Region Sustainable Transport Settlement, which alone accounts for £259m (37%) of planned capital spending in 2024/25. Borrowing by the combined authority will also contribute a substantial amount of funding.

As for the revenue budget, £404m (80%) of planned expenditure has been allocated to the categories of ‘transport delivery’ (£198m) and ‘economic delivery, skills and communities’ (£206m). Important sources of income include central government grants, including £142m for the adult education budget, and a total of £123m received as a transport levy paid by constituent authorities to the combined authority.