Housing

Infrastructure and services

Over the long-term (30 years), major investment will be required to support development in the Growth Areas - but some of this would have been required to meet existing growth requirements anyway. Our approach is to ensure that infrastructure is provided in step with growth, as plans for individual growth locations are developed.

We are working closely across Government to ensure that the necessary funding is in place to ensure that the growing populations have the facilities and services they need. We are:
  • ensuring that funding programmes such as health and education are sufficiently flexible and responsive to the needs of growing communities. The Department of Health has included a Growth Area adjustment in its revenue funding allocations to Primary Care Trusts (PCTs)
  • recognising the pressures on local authorities of rapid growth. As a result of recent changes to the formula for allocating local government Revenue Support Grant, local government funding will now be more responsive to the relatively rapid population growth associated with Growth Areas
  • continuing high levels of mainstream investment in infrastructure. Around £3.5bn is committed or planned by the Department for Transport for infrastructure schemes in the four Growth Areas
In addition to mainstream departmental funding we continue to fund additional infrastructure and other critical interventions to open up major growth locations. Communities and Local Government planned funding in the four Growth Areas now totals around £1.07bn from 2003-04 to 2007-08 to support local and community infrastructure and regeneration projects. In addition, the Government established the £200m Community Infrastructure Fund (CIF) to fund transport projects supporting housing growth in the four Growth Areas. £193m of funding has been approved from CIF. Further details can be found on individual Growth Area pages.

Good progress has been made in planning and providing for infrastructure, but it is important that this continues as plans for the Growth Areas develop. We will consider in future spending reviews what can be afforded beyond the considerable sums already committed. The Treasury is carrying out a cross-government review to help ensure that all Government departments provide the necessary infrastructure to support future housing and population growth. In addition Government is currently consulting on proposals for a Planning Gain Supplement which would recycle a proportion of the uplift in land value created by granting planning permission back to local authorities to fund additional infrastructure to support growth.

In addition to providing significant levels of infrastructure funding into locations where significant growth is expected, we are encouraging local delivery partners to focus on identifying, prioritising and sourcing investment in their locations - based on individual circumstances and priorities, and using a mix of public and private funding. For example, Milton Keynes Partnerships has developed a prospectus identifying and costing the local (eg schools) and strategic (eg roads) infrastructure within Milton Keynes.

You may also be interested in …

On this site

On other sites

Energy performance certificates for new homes

Read about our guidance on energy performance for new homes.

Have your say

My favourites