Some local authorities may have been at a “particular disadvantage” over the award of Levelling Up funds as ministers favoured projects that claimed to be “shovel ready” but subsequently faced delays, according to a report from the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
The report suggested that some bidders progressed through the selection process by being overoptimistic about how prepared their projects were. This negatively affected those councils with “realistic bids”, including from the devolved administrations, that were unfamiliar with presenting bids in this way.
In November 2021, in the first round of the Levelling Up Fund, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (DLUHC) distributed £1.7bn through 105 awards. In total, the government intends to allocate £4.8bn from the fund.
The PAC report stated: “We are concerned that optimism bias has meant realistic bids to the Levelling Up Fund have missed out at the expense of ‘shovel-ready’ projects that have since been beset with delays.”
It also found that ministers finalised the principles for awarding funds only once they knew the identities and scores of shortlisted bidders, which the PAC described as “unsatisfactory”.
The report added that it was “disappointing” that the government had spent billions of pounds on local growth policies without a “strong understanding of what works” or how it will measure performance across different geographical areas and timescales.
PAC chair Dame Meg Hillier said: “Without clear parameters, plans or measures of success, it’s hard to avoid the appearance that government is just gambling taxpayers’ money on policies and programmes that are little more than a slogan, retrofitting the criteria for success and not even bothering to evaluate if it worked.”
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