Devolving Growth?

Infrastructure investment, particularly for transport, has always been organised across a range of administrative levels – central government would push forwards large, national projects while local authorities would facilitate locally significant smaller projects.

One of the biggest political changes recently has been the introduction of the localism and subsequent devolution agendas. Under the last Government in 2010 – and continued by the new Government in 2015 – there has been a desire to devolve powers and budgets to local areas through Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), City Deals, Growth Deals and, most recently, inviting bids for combined authorities.

This paper explores how infrastructure investment and strategy is changing in a more devolved system and highlights ways in which local areas and central bodies can make best use of the funding available in order to achieve growth objectives.