Lord Spencer of Alresford

Increasing productivity is vital in driving economic growth, in turn improving the living standards of working people and putting money into people’s pockets. That is why growth is the priority mission of this government and why we continue to take steps to boost productivity.

This includes increasing the capital envelope by £120 billion over the SR period. Additional capacity announced at Spending Review 2025 and the 10 Year Infrastructure Strategy has allowed the government to increase the capacity of Public Financial Institutions by around 60% this Parliament, to £153 billion. We are also removing barriers to investment through ambitious planning reforms, and championing growth-enhancing sectors through our modern Industrial Strategy.

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), in its role as an independent economic forecaster, has assessed the impact of the increase in capital departmental expenditure limits (CDEL) announced at Autumn Budget 2024 and the planning reforms set out at Spring Statement 2025. The OBR estimated that the CDEL increase would raise real GDP by approximately 0.26% after ten years, while the planning reforms were assessed to increase real GDP by around 0.42% over the same period.