UK Shared Prosperity Fund

Forest of Dean District Council has been awarded £1 million over 3 years from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF). The funding is allocated as follows:

2022/23	2023/24	2024/25
£119,468	£238,936	£641,596

UKSPF is designed to take the place of European funding which has now run out. The council has an approved ‘Local Investment Plan’ for the UKSPF, which sets out how we propose to use the funding through to March 2025.

UKSPF has three themes for investment - 1) Communities & Place, 2) Supporting Local Business each funded from April 2022 to March 2025 and 3) People & Skills funded in 2024/25 only.  

More information on the UK Shared Prosperity Fund can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-shared-prosperity-fund-prospectus/uk-shared-prosperity-fund-prospectus

The issues we’re looking to address

UKSPF seeks to address a whole range of issues through a range of ‘interventions’ prescribed by the Government, from which local councils can choose. Forest of Dean District Council is looking to:

• Support the four town centres and larger villages
• Support organisations to undertake research and technical work to develop plans to improve local places
• Encourage active travel, like cycling and walking
• Support community projects and businesses seeking to tackle the climate crisis, including helping make buildings more energy efficient and making sure the skills exist locally to do this work
• Create good quality, well-paid jobs for local people and help more businesses to start up, expand and survive 
• Promote the Forest of Dean as a visitor destination and a film friendly location to encourage more TV and film production
• Support local businesses through the Forest Growth Hub
• Support specialist training to help people seeking to enter or re-enter employment
• Introduce new Digital Skills and Green Construction Skills training programmes

UKSPF Project Programme

The list of projects we are supporting through the UKSPF during the life of the three year programme can be found below:

Investment Themes	Project	SPF Year 1 2022-23 completed	SPF Year 2 2023-24	SPF Year 3 2024-25	Total Cost
Communities & Place	Forest of Dean District Council (FoDDC) - Sustainable development - Biosphere Initiative	£4,550	£5,000	£ 64,450	£74,000
Communities & Place	FoDDC - Climate Resilience Implementation Plan	£ -	£ 4,000	£18,000	£22,000
Communities & Place	FoDDC - Public Toilets Improvement Programme	£3,039	£40,499	£200,052	£243,590
Communities & Place	Hartpury – Cycleway Feasibility Study	£20,000	£ -	£ -	£20,000
Communities & Place	FoDDC - Active Travel Strategy	£ -	£55,500	£100,000	£155,500
Communities & Place	Coleford Town Council - Coleford Town Centre Regeneration Plan	£10,000	£20,020	£20,020	£50,040
Support for Local Business	FoDDC Business Grants & Loans	£ -	£ -	£41,000	£41,000
Support for Local Business	Forest of Dean & Wye Valley Tourism - Film friendly & digital marketing campaigns	£2,150	£15,860	£15,860	£33,870
Support for Local Business	Forest Economic Partnership (FEP) Secretariat	£2,000	£10,000	£10,000	£22,000
Support for Local Business	FEP Action on Climate - Collaboration Tool (FACCT)	£10,000	£10,000	£ -	£20,000
Support for Local Business	FoDDC - Low Carbon Energy Business Support	£ -	£16,000	£13,000	£29,000
Support for Local Business	LEP - Gloucestershire Growth Hub	£-	£20,000	£59,000	£79,000
People and Skills	GCC - Gloucestershire Employment & Skills Project	£ -	£ -	£70,000	£70,000
People and Skills	FoDDC – Digital Skills Training	£-	£-	£25,000	£25,000
People and Skills	FoDDC – Green Construction Skills Training	£-	£-	£50,000	£50,000
Sub-totals	Communities & Place	£37,589	£125,019	£402,522	£565,130
	Support for Local Business	£14,150	£71,860	£138,860	£224,870
	People and Skills	£ -	£ -	£145,000	£145,000
	External grant administration				£25,000
	Internal grant administration				£40,000
Total					£1,000,000

 

Related Pages

• Invest in the Forest of Dean
• Forest of Dean Levelling Up Fund Success