Independent assessment taking place to explore “factual case” for Wrexham’s City Status bid

The advantages and disadvantages of Wrexham becoming a city are being explored and examined as part of an independent assessment that will help inform the debate ahead of a possible formal bid later this year.

In July it was announced that Wrexham Council had unveiled two ambitious applications that could see the town become a city, and then also becoming a City of Culture with the council promising to share the benefits such a move would entail.

The bid is technically a ‘competition’ held by the Queen, “to grant the prestigious and rare civic honours of ‘City Status’… to a select number of worthy towns and cities in the United Kingdom”.

Since the announcements there has been a gap in public information circulating about the bid, so we enquired to Wrexham Council if that was it due to the time of year, August being a traditionally quiet period for public council business, or if there has been work ongoing.

Chief Executive Ian Bancroft told us, “From a technical point of view we are doing a piece of work around a longer piece of work around Wrexham as a place, coming out of the pandemic and recovery. As part of that piece of work we are looking at the comparisons of what benefits and disadvantages it’s brought to other areas.”

“So our logic in terms of steps is that we’ll get that information back in October. We’ll engage then with people about what the benefits are, what are the disadvantages may be, what some of the perceived disadvantages are or are not. Then, the aim is as was agreed at executive board to bring an executive board report back prior to the deadline of December.

“A lot of work going on behind the scenes to make sure that there’s a real factual case around the bid. Does this support the economic and community recovery of Wrexham, and if it does, what does it support? What are those benefits? Then having that engagement with key people and stakeholders.”

A recent tender documented explained more detail on the place making project specification, “to develop a place making strategy to inform economic recovery following the pandemic; future regeneration interventions; benchmark Wrexham in terms of performance indicators that can be used for future evaluation of significant regeneration activity; and identification of Wrexham’s key attributes that will support inward investment opportunities.”

Councillors have been told, “Whilst this work is predominately focussed on developing a place-based strategy, the advantages and disadvantages of becoming a city as discussed at Executive Board can be explored through this work.”

More detail on the process has been given in the update to councillors:

• By the end of this month an “independent assessment of the benefits and dis-benefits (including but not limited to: economic, social, health & wellbeing) that are associated with the gaining of city status, as experienced by other similar towns in the UK, identification of benchmarking indicators and Wrexham’s key attributes that support inward investment” will be produced.
• A second phase by the end of next month will involve “stakeholder engagement over the findings of phase 1, including Members, key stakeholders and the wider community.
  Third phase up until 8 December 2021”

The decision point in early December on if to progress the City Status application would have to take place ahead of an 8th December deadline, with Wrexham.com told there are hopes for a ‘non-political, educated debate’ on the benefits, the advantages or the disadvantage of city status.

To discover if Wrexham is ‘worthy’ of the status a maximum of eight sides of A4 can be submitted to show how the town meets the proposal against the criteria of:

• Distinct identity
• Civic pride
• Cultural infrastructure, interesting heritage, history and traditions
• Vibrant and welcoming community
• Record of innovation
• Sound governance and administration
• Associations with Royalty
• Other “particularly distinctive features, age, residents or communities who have made widely recognised significant contributions to society and cultural infrastructure”.

Minister of State for the Constitution & Devolution, Chloe Smith, previously said of the civic competition, “The Civic Honours competition is an opportunity to promote your hometown and win an honour for it that will last for all time.

“I encourage entries from local authorities in every part of the UK, from vibrant towns and cities with distinct identities, history, and sense of community.

“The brilliance of the United Kingdom is rooted in diverse and unique communities brought together by a shared sense of civic pride, so I have no doubt the competition will be fierce – but success will be a historic moment of celebration for the winners, which will take its place within Her Majesty’s Platinum Jubilee.”