The second funding round of the £4.8 billion Levelling Up Fund will open to applications on 31 May 2022.

The £4.8 billion Levelling Up Fund will invest in local infrastructure that has a visible impact on people and their communities. This includes a range of high value local investment priorities, including local transport schemes, urban regeneration projects and cultural assets.

The Fund is jointly managed by HM Treasury (HMT), the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) and the Department for Transport (DfT).

The second round of the Fund will focus on the same three themes as the first round: smaller transport projects that make a genuine difference to local areas; town centre and high street regeneration; and support for maintaining and expanding the UK’s world-leading portfolio of cultural and heritage assets, in particular:

• Transport investments including (but not limited to) public transport, active travel, bridge repairs, bus priority lanes, local road improvements and major structural maintenance, and accessibility improvements. The Fund is requesting proposals for high-impact small, medium and by exception larger local transport schemes to reduce carbon emissions, improve air quality, cut congestion, support economic growth and improve the experience of transport users.
• Regeneration and town centre investment, building on the Towns Fund framework to upgrade eyesore buildings and dated infrastructure, acquire and regenerate brownfield sites, invest in secure community infrastructure and crime reduction, and bring public services and safe community spaces into town and city centres.
• Cultural investment maintaining, regenerating, or creatively repurposing existing cultural, creative, heritage and sporting assets, or creating new assets that serve those purposes including theatres, museums, galleries, production facilities, libraries, visitor attractions (and associated green spaces), sports and athletics facilities, heritage buildings and sites, and assets that support the visitor economy.

All areas in the UK are able to access the Fund. Specifically, in Great Britain:

• Unitary authorities (including metropolitan borough councils), London borough councils and district councils in two tier areas in England; and, unitary authorities in Scotland and Wales are eligible to submit bids.
• County councils with transport powers, combined authorities, mayoral combined authorities and the Greater London Authority (GLA) are eligible to submit one transport bid; and unitary authorities in Scotland and Wales, and unitary authorities in England with transport powers are able to submit one additional bid which must be for transport.

Local authorities may submit joint bids.

Each bid submitted by local institutions can be a bid for an individual project or a package bid consisting of multiple projects.

The Fund will set aside at least £800 million across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland over four years from 2021-2022 to 2024-2025. For the first round of funding, at least 9% of total UK allocations will be set aside for Scotland, 5% for Wales, and 3% for Northern Ireland.

The Fund will focus investment in projects that require up to £20m of funding. However, there is also scope for investing in larger high value transport projects, by exception. Bids above £20m and below £50m will be accepted for transport projects only, such as road schemes, and can be submitted by any bidding local authority. They will be subject to a more detailed business case process and will need to score highly overall. Local authorities may wish to consider pooling funding from their bids in order to improve the chance of taking forward a larger transport scheme.

In addition, for the second round of the Fund, the fund is prepared to support up to two large bids for up to £50 million under the Fund’s culture and heritage investment theme. These bids must be for flagship projects and be in line with the Fund’s focus on highly visible interventions that boost local pride in place. These must be for at least 90% culture.

Applications to the second round of funding will be accepted on the online portal from 31 May 2022 and will close on 6 July 2022 (12 noon).

 

How To Apply

The second round of funding will open to applications on 31 May 2022 and will close on 6 July 2022 (12 noon).

Applications must be submitted online through the application portal.

For more information, visit the GOV UK website.