This year’s local elections will have an impact on higher education and skills

Alongside a by-election, and elections for twenty-three councils, 1 May will see people in six metropolitan areas vote for a mayor.

In Hull and East Yorkshire, and in Greater Lincolnshire, these are the first mayoral elections – whereas in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, North Tyneside, Doncaster, and the West of England the defending incumbents are Labour (at least, in the storied case of Dan Norris, previously Labour).

While the North Tyneside and Doncaster races are single local authority area metropolitan borough mayors (the former previously falling under the North of Tyne Combined Authority and now part of the North East Combined Authority), the other four races directly concern mayoral combined authorities.

If you are reading this it is very likely that you care as much about English devolution as you do about UK professional basketball – meaning you’ll have missed a sensational double-overtime win for Bristol Flyers on the the final day of the regular season, and that many so-called metro mayors already have powers relating to adult skills and apprenticeship commissioning, alongside aspirations around research and higher level skills policy.

This is not about gold chains and opening the summer fair – this latest round of metro mayors will have serious powers, and an impact on higher education.

None of the mayoralities up for grabs this time round are the so-called “trailblazers” – Greater Manchester and the West Midlands will get integrated settlements (single payments from central government devolving budgets over a range of policy areas) from 2025-26 with four further combined authorities (North East, South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, and Liverpool City Region) confirmed to follow on in 2026-27.

These enhanced deals cover access to appropriate education and training for all over 19s, and include a duty to encourage adults to engage in skills provision and to offer statutory free courses where appropriate. But that perhaps understates the level of ambition. For instance, in Greater Manchester the plan is for an “integrated technical education city region based” around an “MBacc” – a technical education alternative sitting alongside the academic EBacc route and starting, similarly, at age 14. This will articulate with a focus on T levels and post-18 apprenticeships (including degree apprenticeships) as a complete pathway.

The other existing strategic authorities are well on their way to similar levels of devolution, while the newer mayoralities will be working towards such skills independence. In Hull and East Yorkshire the new combined authority starts off with full devolution of the adult education budget (including free job related courses) in 2026-27 – with Manchester-style skills funding devolution following in the years to come. Greater Lincolnshire (which only came into being on 5 February this year) will start in a similar place.

These skills related plans don’t just stop at technical education. The longer term Greater Lincolnshire proposal is for:

Government, research and industry brought together to boost business innovation that leads to more high skill high wage jobs

All these areas already have access to UKRI data on where and what investment is made nationally in innovation in their regions. There’s an expectation that mayors will have a joint planning role with Innovate UK on local innovation strategies and linked investment. And at the bleeding edge there is talk of actual research funding being devolved – in the form of a planned regional innovation funding programme.

So should former minister and versatile singer-songwriter Andrea Jenkyns manage to confirm what the polls are suggesting and win Greater Lincolnshire for Reform she would arguably have more power over skills and innovation than she did when she was ensconced in the Department for Education. Quite the thought.