Research and analysis

Adur: UKSPF summary evaluation plan

Published 4 April 2025

Applies to England

Summary of the local place

Adur, in West Sussex, is a geographically small area that is predominantly urban, characterised by a growing population, particularly the over 65s and under 15s. Local residents typically earn less than the South East and United Kingdom (UK) averages. Local policy priorities include tackling homelessness, while the district also declared a climate emergency in July 2019.

Map of Adur District Council

Adur’s United Kingdom Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) interventions are focused on three areas: supporting local businesses, tackling the cost-of-living crisis, and introducing more sustainable transport solutions. None of the UKSPF funded interventions are spatially restricted. They have included a cycle hire scheme, work to identify and engage with the most vulnerable residents and supporting businesses to become more sustainable.

Unit of analysis

UKSPF funded interventions in Adur provide support at the individual, business and community levels. The evaluation will collect evidence across these levels and will study impact at a district-wide level as UKSPF interventions are not spatially bounded. Thematically, the evaluation will focus on all three UKSPF priority areas as all three are strategically important to Adur District Council (ADC). ADC has funded five interventions through UKSPF. Our evaluation will conduct a broad assessment of all of these, with in-depth case studies of four activities that are likely to have generated the greatest impact. These are the Cycle Hire Scheme, Sustainability support for businesses, Innovation support for businesses, and the Proactive programme to help identify and engage vulnerable residents. Table 1.1 shows the interventions and individual activities funded (with further information provided in Table 2.1 below).

UKSPF interventions in Adur and list of priority activities

UKSPF priority	Interventions funded (lighter touch assessment)	Priority Activities (Individual activities for in-depth case studies)
Communities and Place	Sustainable Transport Solutions	Cycle Hire Scheme
	Community Participation	N/A
Supporting Local Businesses	Business support	Sustainability support
		Innovation support
People and Skills	Cost of living	Proactive
	Fuel poverty	N/A

Methodological approach

We will adopt a mixed-methods approach that combines primary research, secondary data analysis, and quasi-experimental approaches, underpinned by a contribution analysis framework.

Process evaluation

The evaluation framework for Adur aims to provide a robust evidence base by triangulating data from various sources, such as monitoring, secondary data, and primary research. The process evaluation will consider the fund design, fund implementation, activity delivery, and data collection and monitoring of UKSPF in Adur. We will collect evidence on these through reviews of local data and documentation (e.g. programme monitoring data), interviews with local stakeholders (e.g. ADC delivery team, delivery providers and intervention/activity teams, and ADC directors), and secondary data (e.g. Active Lives Survey, Claimant Count data) to understand if local UKSPF delivery addresses local needs.

Impact evaluation

Adur’s UKSPF interventions have primarily focused on intangible social benefits. These are difficult to quantify. Consequently, for most outcome and impact areas, quasi-experimental design (QED) is not feasible given difficulties in measuring progress quantitatively. Additionally, with all of the Communities and Place and some of the Supporting Local Businesses interventions available to all Adur residents, there is not always a feasible non-beneficiary group to use as a control.

For two outcome areas, quasi-experimental approaches appear feasible:

• We will study the additional impact of UKSPF business support measures on business survival and employment, and their net contribution to Adur’s wider economic performance.
• To assess increases in residents’ cycle usage over time, we will examine Cycle Hire Scheme usage in two different parts of Adur. We will exploit the staggered nature of activity delivery (not all cycle hire sites went live at the same time) and use Pipeline Design Analysis (explained in Section 6.2)

For all other outcome and impact areas, the evaluation will adopt a theory-based evaluation (TBE) approach. Specifically, it will use a contribution analysis framework (see Appendix A) to systematically test all the evidence collected to determine whether the Theory of Change is a valid explanation of change, and how far external factors has influenced outcomes.

Economic evaluation

Following the National Audit Office’s 4Es, the evaluation will consider programme economy (by assessing ability to leverage additional in-kind or financial support), efficiency (by calculating costs per output and costs per outcomes, and benchmarking these against comparator programmes), effectiveness (using contribution analysis and QED to determine whether UKSPF is plausible driver for outcomes), and equity (determining whether UKSPF support reached the communities most in need of it).

Data to support the evaluation

Primary data collection

The evaluation plan for Adur’s UKSPF interventions relies heavily on primary data collection, including beneficiary surveys and semi-structured interviews.

• Beneficiary surveys - It will not be feasible to survey beneficiaries of all interventions. Instead, we will prioritise surveys with beneficiaries of the priority activities listed in Table 1.1. We also plan a survey of ADC beneficiaries of community participation.
• Semi-structured interviews – we will collect evidence for both the impact and process evaluation. Interviews with the ADC UKSPF delivery team and wider ADC staff, with key strategic stakeholders (e.g. the Chamber of Commerce), and delivery providers will cover both intervention-level and programme-level perspectives on experiences, achieved outcomes, and UKSPF attribution. Beneficiary interviews will focus on specific key issues.

Secondary data sources

The Active Lives Survey, Office for Road and Rail data, and ADC monitoring data, including (the Proactive CRM (customer relationship management tool), will help determine how far Adur’s interventions have reached their target beneficiaries.

To measure impact, we will analyse Cycle Hire Scheme monitoring data. We will also use the Proactive CRM to help examine ADC’s ability to reach the most vulnerable, to identify improvements in residents’ financial position over time. Where possible, we will use Companies House data, Crunchbase and the Interdepartmental Business Register to monitor employment and business survival rates over time and assess if UKSPF business support activity has influenced these.