Research and analysis

Cornwall and Isles of Scilly: UKSPF summary evaluation plan

Published 4 April 2025

Applies to England

Summary of the local place

Cornwall and Isles of Scilly sit at the end of the South West peninsula and is a mix of rural areas with small coastal communities and several larger towns. The area faces a range of social and economic challenges and opportunities, from low productivity and pay to a vibrant environment and range of emerging sectors.

Under the EU, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly (CIOS) were categorised as “less developed” and funding allocations of over €1 billion in EU Structural Funds were granted to the area since 2000.

Map of Cornwall and Isles of Scilly

The Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Investment Plan identified key areas for the region to focus UKSPF allocations on, including raising productivity, improving standards of living and generating inclusive growth, while putting decarbonisation and the core of all activities. Cornwall and Isles of Scilly developed the Good Growth Programme as the vehicle to oversee distribution of the £132 million in funding and have allocated this to 143 projects (as of August 2024).

Unit of analysis

The proposal is for the evaluation to focus on three thematic areas for deep dive impact analysis alongside a meta-analysis of all completed project level evaluation reports. This will best capture whether some of the aims of the Good Growth programme have been realised while overcoming the barriers of the large number of interventions and programme scale in Cornwall and Isles of Scilly.

The selected units of analysis will allow for evaluation of the effectiveness of the Cornwall and Isles of Scilly model, where two of the three selected thematic areas will test the cross-cutting theme aspects (Good Growth Principles) of the strategically co-ordinated approach. This is recognised as a more holistic approach to evaluating UKSPF than in other areas, and one from which it would be valuable to draw lessons.

The 3 thematic areas are:

• Research and Development – focuses on the outcomes for businesses from the range of support available in CIOS targeting innovation. This includes facilities and infrastructure as well as direct business interventions. There is an opportunity to explore the perception of CIOS as a place for innovative activity, as well as some opportunities to quantitatively test the impact of interventions on businesses.
• Decarbonisation – is a Good Growth Principle which cuts across most interventions in some form with the purpose from CIOS to change how the net zero agenda is considered and incorporated into delivery. By exploring the extent to which interventions and delivery projects have been able to introduce different forms of decarbonisation, the evaluation will test how much behaviour may have changed with further longer-term impact consequences.
• Skills and wages – is another Good Growth Principle as well as part of the People and Skills Investment Priority. By embedding skills improvements across interventions CIOS is looking to shift how upskilling is considered, alongside the specific skills interventions and Investment Plan ambitions to improve wages.

Methodological approach

Process evaluation

The process evaluation will analyse core areas including fund design, fund implementation, delivery of interventions and data collection and monitoring. The Cornwall and Isles of Scilly case study will particularly focus on analysing the effectiveness of strategic implementation of Good Growth principles across the interventions.

Process evaluation tasks will involve review of data, documents and changes to policy and socio-economic context, consultations with delivery and strategic stakeholders and surveys with project delivery bodies.

Impact evaluation

Quasi-experimental design (QED) approaches have been considered for each element of the evaluation, with the following conclusions.

• Research and Development – it is assessed that a QED would be viable. The approach would be to identify a comparator group, using the Data City platform or businesses who applied and withdrew, with which to explore changes in key innovation related variables. This may be supported by utilisation of secondary data from Etic Lab which can look at innovative behaviour among businesses and the extent to which intervention group businesses in Cornwall and Isles of Scilly display this behaviour relative to a comparison group.
• Decarbonisation – it is assessed that a QED would not be viable. The timeframes and available evidence means that conducting a QED approach would not be possible. Instead, the impact evaluation for this theme will use a contribution analysis, drawing on evidence from management information, secondary data and primary research, as well as the meta-analysis to inform any conclusions.
• Skills and wages – it is assessed that a QED would not be viable. The combination of available evidence and confounding factors restrict the ability to conduct a QED approach for this theme. A contribution analysis will instead be conducted drawing on evidence from management information, secondary data and primary research, as well as the meta-analysis to inform any conclusions.

Economic evaluation

It is proposed that the economic evaluation will follow the 4E’s approach set out by the National Audit office, considering economy, efficiency, effectiveness and equity of the programme investments. Where possible, this will incorporate cost effectiveness analysis drawing on the net additional impact analysis from the quasi-experimental design relating to the Research and Development theme.

Data to support the evaluation

The following data sources will be used across the 3 main strands of the impact evaluation:

Primary data collection

Research and Development	Decarbonisation	Skills and Wages
■ Stakeholder consultation (strategic and delivery) ■ Surveys of supported businesses ■ Surveys of non-supported businesses (if possible)	■ Stakeholder consultation (strategic and delivery) including research to test carbon savings	■ Stakeholder consultation (strategic and delivery) ■ Surveys of supported individuals

Secondary data sources

Research and Development	Decarbonisation	Skills and Wages
■ ONS data on innovation/ research and development ■ HMRC data on tax credits ■ Local programme data on RandD expenditure, collaborations and facilities (floorspace) ■ Investment data from Deal Room and Pitchbook)	■ Emissions data from DESNZ ■ Local programme data on investment in decarbonisation activities	■ ONS data on unemployment, earnings and economic activity. ■ Insight from Lightcast showing skills shortages ■ Local programme data on course completions.