Insider Media Limited

Warwickshire County Cricket Club’s major refurbishment at Edgbaston will not be compromised by the £1m axed from its investment, Insider has learnt. Regional development agency Advantage West Midlands (AWM) has made the cut as part of £37m of savings demanded by the coalition government. Colin Povey, chief executive of the Warwickshire club, said it “already has a number of initiatives in train” to ensure overall funding is not compromised.

The cut to the cricket ground’s budget was one of 120 projects which AWM said would be affected by the budget slash.

Tim Gebbels, corporate director of strategy and communications at the doomed regional development agency, admitted that the organisation was in the dark regarding future cuts. He told Insider: “None of us know what the October spending review will bring – we all have our own private speculations, but we’ll have to wait and see”.

AWM made £37m of savings, including almost £35m which was slashed from the budgets of supported projects. The regional development agency said that a further £2m was saved by a lower than expected take-up of business grants.

Of the 120 projects affected by the budget cut, 11 projects, including the region’s Gateway Marketing Programme, have had their entire budgets axed.

Gebbels said that the schemes which failed to receive funding may now look to other sources, including European organizations.

Although £1m has been slashed from the cricket ground’s budget, AWM will still invest £2.1m in the project. Povey said that the club had been “aware of the project review for some time” and had been kept fully informed by AWM.

He said: “The bulk of the money covered by the club’s funding agreement with AWM remains secure. We continue to work with our advisors and with AWM to minimize the impact of this decision. The club already has a number of initiatives in train to ensure that the overall funding for the project is not compromised.”

In a statement, Mick Laverty, chief executive of Advantage West Midlands, said:“The collective efforts of our agency staff and our partners have delivered all the savings that the government asked of us.

“The scale and pace of the cuts required meant that inevitably some difficult and unpopular decisions had to be made.

“Our joint focus has always been to safeguard priority projects - the ones that create most jobs and the greatest growth and support the most competitive businesses across the West Midlands.

“The government intends to abolish RDAs at the end of March 2012 and is putting in place new economic delivery bodies such as Local Enterprise Partnerships.

“We still have a significant portfolio of project investments and assets that may transfer to successor bodies. We are awaiting government clarification on this and a range of other matters.”

AWM still has a budget of approximately £250m for 2010-11.