National Wealth Fund launches new Regional Project Accelerator for local government

The Regional Project Accelerator will transform NWF’s support for local government, focusing its support and wider investment expertise on the places and projects with the most potential to drive local growth.

This new approach is in line with the Government’s regional strategy and has been agreed with relevant central government departments and our shareholder, HM Treasury, in order to prioritise longer-term and deeper strategic partnerships with high growth Mayoral Strategic Authorities (MSAs) and City Regions in the UK. It will allow more support for complex and significant flagship projects across the country, driving positive change for local communities in support of the Government’s growth mission.

As part of the enhanced offer, local authorities will also have the opportunity to share experience with peers through a digitally enabled knowledge service which is expected to harness AI technology.

The Regional Project Accelerator, which builds on NWF’s three years’ experience working with local partners on advisory and lending projects right across the UK, offers:

• Strategic Partnerships – with four partnerships now launched, NWF teams will collaborate with MSAs and City Regions for the longer term. They will help to develop projects and portfolios to ensure they are investment ready and support Local Growth Plans.

• Flagship project advisory support – NWF teams will provide focused longer-term support for flagship projects, prioritising MSAs, Core Cities, City Regions and devolved nations, not yet in the strategic partnerships programme. 

• Local Government Knowledge Service – A new digitally enabled offering to share NWF knowledge and experience and enable peer-to-peer learning, with online resources, conferences, webinars and targeted one-to-one support.

• Low-cost lending direct to local government – the NWF has £4bn lending capacity to local authorities throughout the UK, which it will use to support complex, transformational and higher-risk projects that align with Government priorities and regional and local ambitions. 

The NWF is already supporting four MSAs through its new Strategic Partnerships with agreements signed with Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), Glasgow City Region (GCR), West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) and West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA).

Under the partnerships programme, the NWF will work closely with MSA and City Region teams, providing banking and advisory expertise to better support project and portfolio development.

With Strategic Partnership Agreements now in place, NWF is working at pace with Partners to identify, shape and execute investment opportunities in agreed priority sectors, including place-based regeneration, transport and net zero infrastructure. Projects already confirmed for support are the Clyde Metro (GCR), Greenpower Park (WMCA), GM Heat Networks (GMCA) and Mass Transit (WYCA).

Ian Brown, NWF Interim CEO, said:

Local government is critical to the UK’s growth and clean energy ambitions and so it’s important that we target our support both where it is most needed and where it will have the biggest impact. This new approach means the NWF will be able to focus its resources and expertise to help deliver crucial projects in key areas.

Lorna Pimlott, National Wealth Fund Managing Director, Local Authority Function, said:

Having listened to our shareholder – HM Treasury, feedback from partners, and learned from our activity to date, we are transforming our support offer to local authorities. The NWF is uniquely placed to support and partner with local government to catalyse public and private sector sources of finance, and this new, more strategic way of working will help us deliver maximum impact for local authorities and their communities while boosting growth across the UK.

Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham said:

Our partnership with the National Wealth Fund is key to delivering our investment pipeline. Working together, we can maximise the impact of public funding to unlock major new investment for Greater Manchester. We have the UK’s fastest growing economy, but we’re ready to go even further to support the national growth mission. We recently set out our vision for our next decade of growth, underpinned by an integrated pipeline that brings together transport, housing, innovation and energy investments. By working with the National Wealth Fund we’re ready to deliver well-connected developments and transformative regeneration projects across our city region.

Richard Parker, Mayor of the West Midlands, said:

This partnership is another vote of confidence in our region and our plan to grow the economy with high-quality jobs, cutting edge innovation and green technology. A strong West Midlands is critical to the National Wealth Fund’s mission to power growth across the whole of the country. In the first instance we will work with them to supercharge plans for a world-class hub for battery manufacturing and technology at Green Power Park in Coventry, and will continue our work to build a highly skilled workforce in the fast-growing advanced manufacturing and clean energy sectors.