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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with reference to the Levelling Up White Paper, what steps he plans to take to ensure that the Shared Prosperity Fund will contribute to increasing R&D public investment outside the Greater South East by 40 percent.

Leaving the EU enables the UK to identify UK-specific priorities and create a fund which invests in UK priorities and targets funding where it is needed most.

The UKSPF improves on these funds by: focusing on UK priorities rather than policies dictated by the EU; Giving local areas a greater say in investment priorities, by giving more direct accountability to elected local leaders.

Places will be empowered to identify and build on their own strengths and needs at a local level. Should they choose to do so, they can fund Research and Development (R&D) related interventions under the ‘supporting local businesses’ pillar of the fund. However, it will be for places to decide how much of their allocation they spend on R&D depending on their locally identified priorities.