Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, pursuant to the Answer of 27 February 2023 to Question 150593 on Regional Planning and Development: Local Government Finance, what (a) capability and (b) capacity funding his Department has provided local authorities in those funds.

As we have set out previously, this department has provided capability and capacity funding to local authorities bidding across each of the funds mentioned.

For the Levelling Up Fund, £125,000 in capacity funding was provided to all category 1 Local Authorities in England, and equivalents in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, to help develop bids across the life of the Levelling Up Fund.

For the Community Renewal Fund, £2 million was provided to the lead authorities of each of the 100 priority places ranging from £20,000 to £100,000 to help them coordinate and appraise bids.

For the UKSPF, £20,000 was provided for each lead local authority and £40,000 for each Mayoral Combined Authority, the Greater London Authority and lead local authorities coordinating regional investment plans in Wales and Scotland. This funding supported initial preparatory work, including developing local investment plans.

For Town Deals, £21.4 million in capacity funding was paid out to lead Local Authorities, and support was also available through the Towns Fund Delivery partner. Places shortlisted for Future High Streets Fund were each awarded up to £150,000 revenue funding (totalling £14.5 million across the programme) to support the development of final business cases.