Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will recognise the four counties of Cornwall, Devon, Somerset and Dorset as the Great South West economic region, as recommended by the relevant local enterprise partnerships; and if he will make a statement.

The Government is committed to pan-regional partnerships, as part of our commitment to further devolution and level up the country. These non-statutory partnerships will need to operate at scale, driving greater levels of foreign investment into the UK, and capitalising on major economic opportunities over a pan-regional geography.

I am grateful to the Counties of Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, and Dorset for their proposals as presented in the Great South West prospectus and we will be setting out further detail through the Devolution White Paper.