THE recession has wiped £50 million from the value of the taxpayers' stake in some of the biggest regeneration projects in the Westcountry, WMN London Editor Matt Chorley exclusively reveals.

In just four schemes where the Regional Development Agency ploughed money into boosting the economy across Devon and Cornwall, millions of pounds have been written off.

The slump in property prices has seen the value of the agency's assets plummet, including St Austell town centre, Moorlands sheepskin factory in Glastonbury, Royal William Yard in Plymouth and Exeter University Innovation Centre.

The RDA will now be forced to hold on to its depleted assets in the hope of recouping some of the lost funds if the market bounces back.

The agency insisted the drop in value was in line with reductions seen in the property market during the recession. But business leaders claimed some "bad" decisions had been made, and said the RDA had to be more open about how it uses taxpayers' money.

In June, the RDA was forced to announce cuts in its budget totalling £56 million, in part due to a dramatic drop in income from selling off assets when redevelopment projects had been completed.

The project to redevelop St Austell has been one of the region's most high-profile regeneration schemes bankrolled, in part, by the RDA. However, figures obtained by the WMN, show the £7.8 million value of the agency's remaining stake in the project has fallen by more than £6 million. The RDA initially invested £31.6 million in the scheme, much of which has now been taken over by developers.

The £33 million project to revive the derelict sheepskin factories on the Moorlands site in Glastonbury has seen the RDA write-off more than £13.6 million, after its remaining stake fell in value to just £1.3 million. And the second phase of the Exeter University Innovation Centre has also been affected by the downturn. The RDA initially invested £9.7 million. Of the asset it retained, there has been a fall of £1 million to only £750,000.

The RDA's stake in Royal William Yard in Plymouth has been valued as worthless, with £32 million written off. The staggering loss has been offset by £32.2 million in funding from English Partnerships in 1999 to help redevelop the site.

Many of the schemes were launched at the height of the economic boom and all the write-offs were made at the end of the 2008-2009 financial year, whereas other RDA-backed projects completed sooner have fared better. For example, the Temple Court redevelopment in Bristol paid for itself and the agency received all of its money back.

The RDA insists that the fall in value of the St Austell, Exeter and Glastonbury assets is in line with the industry average drop of around a third. But Tim Jones, chief executive of Devon and Cornwall Business Council, said today's revelations will "go down very badly with the business community". He called for the RDA to make a "clear statement about their property portfolio and where it is going in future".

"I think fundamentally they did make some bad decisions and continued to keep digging when the evidence said 'don't'.

"If they are going to be trusted with further investments in the future, there needs to be much more transparency."

But he added that the RDA was still needed to invest in schemes where the private sector would not, which included taking some risk with public money.

James Harper, the RDA's head of communications, said claw-back clauses in contracts would allow the RDA to recoup some of its losses if the value of the assets increased again in the future.