The government is directing approximately £700m towards the development of up to ten major industrial and commercial sites across the UK, targeting £2bn in private investment and tens of thousands of jobs over time.
The Strategic Sites Accelerator will use public finance and specialist development support to address barriers preventing commercially viable projects from proceeding. These include planning constraints, insufficient electricity grid capacity, infrastructure costs, and difficulties securing finance.
Mayors and local leaders are being brought into the process of identifying projects with the potential to attract major investment. The government wants the programme to concentrate resources on locations where private developers have credible commercial interest but cannot resolve development obstacles independently.
Support will be provided through the Office for Investment and National Wealth Fund, combining their investment capabilities and relationships with developers, local authorities, and prospective occupiers.
The programme can provide loans, equity investment, targeted grants, and technical assistance, depending on the requirements of individual sites. The intention is to finance specific interventions that would make developments commercially deliverable, rather than subsidise projects without demonstrable investor demand.
The Accelerator is being established as a pilot supporting between six and ten sites during the current Parliament. Developers must show that their projects align with the government’s industrial strategy priorities and have the potential to secure most of their financing from commercial sources.
Eligible developments are expected to support strategically important industries, including advanced manufacturing, clean energy, digital infrastructure, and other sectors identified as priorities for investment. Projects will be assessed according to their economic potential, commercial readiness, and the barriers that public support could resolve.
The importance of infrastructure readiness is particularly apparent in manufacturing and data-intensive industries. A developer may have customers interested in occupying a site but remain unable to proceed because a grid connection is unavailable or supporting transport infrastructure requires investment beyond the project’s immediate commercial return.
In these circumstances, coordinating infrastructure provision, planning decisions, and financing can determine whether a substantial industrial project advances. The Accelerator is intended to bring those functions together, with public funding concentrated on overcoming identifiable obstacles.
Projects will enter an initial screening process covering their location, planning status, development partners, commercial interest, and financial requirements. Proposals considered suitable can progress to a more detailed assessment involving the Office for Investment and National Wealth Fund.
Developers and their delivery partners must demonstrate experience in comparable schemes and a credible route to raising private investment. The programme will also assess whether public participation offers value for money and would enable activity that otherwise faces a material obstacle.
The Strategic Sites Accelerator was included in the government’s industrial strategy and received further funding detail in the October Budget. Its latest phase places greater emphasis on working with regional leaders to identify the developments most capable of attracting substantial private capital.
The government expects the programme to attract up to £2bn of private investment. That remains a target dependent on the selection, financing, and delivery of individual sites, rather than investment already committed by developers or occupiers.
Initial applications are being assessed through a staged selection process. The resulting investment decisions will determine where the £700m package is deployed and which major industrial developments receive support to progress towards construction.
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