The new Long Term Plan for towns

 The government has announced the first 55 towns across the UK to benefit from our new £1 billion Long-term Plan for Towns, levelling up left behind towns as we deliver a brighter future for the UK. 

• 55 towns will benefit from our new £1.1 billion endowment fund to deliver our long-term plan to regenerate left behind towns.
• The Long-Term Plan for Towns  will allocate a ten-year endowment-style fund of £20 million to be spent on local people’s priorities, like regenerating local high streets and town centres, improving transport and securing public safety.
• This long-term commitment will allow towns to plan for their future, rather than the end of the financial year.

Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, said: 

"Towns are the place most of us call home and where most of us go to work. But politicians have always taken towns for granted and focused on cities.  

The result is the half-empty high streets, run-down shopping centres and anti-social behaviour that undermine many towns’ prosperity and hold back people’s opportunity – and without a new approach, these problems will only get worse.  

That changes today. Our Long-Term Plan for Towns puts funding in the hands of local people themselves to invest in line with their priorities, over the long-term. That is how we level up."

Levelling Up Secretary, Michael Gove added:    

"We know that in our towns the values of hard work and solidarity, common sense and common purpose, endeavour and quiet patriotism have endured across generations. But for too long, too many of our great British towns have been overlooked and undervalued.  

We are putting this right through our Long-Term Plan for Towns backed by over £1 billion of levelling up funding.   

This will empower communities in every part of the UK to take back control of their future, taking long term decisions in the interests of local people. It will mean more jobs, more opportunities and a brighter future for our towns and the people who live and work in them."

The first 55 towns to benefit are:

 

Mansfield 

Boston 

Worksop 

Skegness 

Newark-on-Trent 

Chesterfield 

Clifton (Nottingham) 

Spalding 

Kirkby-in-Ashfield 

Clacton-on-Sea 

Great Yarmouth 

Eston 

Jarrow 

Washington 

Blyth (Northumberland) 

Hartlepool 

Spennymoor 

Darwen 

Chadderton 

Heywood 

Ashton-under-Lyne 

Accrington 

Leigh (Wigan) 

Farnworth 

Nelson (Pendle) 

Kirkby 

Burnley 

Hastings 

Bexhill-on-Sea 

Ryde 

Torquay 

Smethwick 

Darlaston 

Bilston (Wolverhampton) 

Dudley (Dudley) 

Grimsby 

Castleford 

Doncaster 

Rotherham 

Barnsley 

Scunthorpe 

Keighley 

Dewsbury 

Scarborough 

Merthyr Tydfil 

Cwmbrân 

Wrexham 

Barry (Vale of Glamorgan) 

Greenock 

Irvine 

Kilmarnock 

Coatbridge 

Clydebank 

Dumfries 

Elgin