In May 2021 Tracy Brabin was elected as the first Mayor of West Yorkshire. One of her Mayoral Pledges was to lead a Creative New Deal, to ensure culture and the creative industries are part of the broader economic recovery strategy. The West Yorkshire Combined Authority included Culture and the Creative Industries in the West Yorkshire Investment Strategy 2021-2024 (WYIS) as one of six Investment Priorities.
The Combined Authority’s Culture, Heritage and Sport (CHS) Framework outlines its plan to grow and sustain culture, heritage and sport in the region, across four thematic strands of People, Place, Skills and Business.
In 2024, the Combined Authority announced a £2.3 million investment in the region's creative industries through the You Can Make It Here initiative. This programme offers tailored support to boost skills and business capabilities within the sector, aligning with the Skills and Business strands of the CHS framework.
The Combined Authority has engaged Wavehill and Counterculture to evaluate a suite of skills and business support projects under this initiative. These include Freelancer and Microbusiness Support, Export and Music Sector Support, and the Mayor’s Screen Diversity Programme, which features work experiences and the Mayor’s Kay Mellor Writer Development project. This builds on Wavehill's extensive experience evaluating projects across the arts, heritage and creative industries, as well as skills and business support.
In the programme’s first phase, collaboration with the Combined Authority will focus on designing and implementing a monitoring framework and strategy that aligns with partner requirements. This includes establishing an evaluation framework, encompassing process and impact methodologies to assess the individual projects and the overall programme. We will also be working with partners to assess and develop their monitoring processes to review how they align with the Combined Authority and the evaluation’s needs.
The interim evaluation will assess the progress made and highlight lessons learned to guide the remainder of the initiative. The final assessment will provide a comprehensive impact evaluation, building on interim findings to measure the programme's overall success and influence on the creative industries in West Yorkshire.
See more of our work in the arts, heritage, and creative industries.
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