21.08.15
DCLG devolution director announced
Planning Inspectorate (PINS) chief executive Simon Ridley will return to the Department for Communities & Local Government (DCLG) as the new director general for devolution.
Ridley, who acted as the director of local government finance at DCLG from 2010-14, will now take charge of ‘decentralisation and local growth’.
The newly created job, which comes with a salary of up to £130,000 per year, will mean working with the Treasury and BIS in “leading and driving forward the decentralisation and local growth agenda”.
DLCG chief planner, Steve Quartermain, will take over as interim chief of PINS as Ridley moves on to the new role.
PSE previously reported on the DCLG’s search for a new director to oversee devolution within England, which the job description had described as “a key priority for the new government”.
The job description read: “DCLG is the lead department for developing and implementing the new framework for decentralisation and local growth, working closely with other departments, and with cities, local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) and local authorities. In the light of the new government’s priorities, we are creating a new role to focus on this at director general level, to support our secretary of state in driving ambitious change.”
Ridley will sit on the DCLG executive team and department board alongside the George Osborne and ministers.