UK Shared Prosperity Fund

About the UK Shared Prosperity Fund

The UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) is a central pillar of the Government’s levelling up agenda and provides £2.6 billion of funding for local investment by March 2025. The fund aims to improve pride in place and increase life chances across the country, investing in communities and place, supporting local business, and people and skills. You can find out more in the UK Shared Prosperity Fund prospectus on the Government website.

To access this funding, local authorities were required to submit investment plans to Government for approval by the Department for Levelling Up Housing and Communities.

The Council gathered stakeholder input to give their views on what are the most pressing local challenges that need to be addressed, and the projects and initiatives that could best address them. This input was combined with data about the local area and existing funding, the Government criteria, and wider strategic priorities to inform the development of the investment plan.

Following Government approval of our plan, we can confirm Derby City Council has been awarded £6.1 million of core UKSPF funding that needs to be utilised by 31 March 2025.

This funding has three core investment priorities:

• communities and place
• supporting local business
• people and skills.

More information about the UKSPF Plan we submitted to Government along with selected Interventions, Outputs and Outcomes can be found in Derby's Investment Plan and Associated Deliverables.

Open Call: Supporting Local Business

This Open Call is focused on the Supporting Local Business Investment priority and is only open to eligible organisations that can design and deliver business support programmes.

Once these awards have been confirmed there will be a future opportunity for eligible businesses to access support from our chosen providers.

Indicative funding for the Supporting Local Business Investment Priority Area has been set to approximately £2.35 million for 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2025.

The Council has developed four priority areas which this funding is focused upon:

• Early years (£345,000) - Programmes to enable entrepreneurs to start and grow businesses in their first years in Derby.
• Sector and innovation opportunities (£1.13 million) - Programmes that champion innovation in product, process or service delivery, enabling company development in Derby key sectors.
• Inward investment (£600,000) - A marketing programme to bring new key sector companies or to support new external investment into the city.
• Recruitment, skills, and growth advisory supporting roles – (£300,000) Supporting roles that help with recruitment and skills provision and growth and scale-up advice.

Application process

This Open Call closed to new applications at 10am on Tuesday 7 March 2023.

We aim to notify the outcome of our initial assessment and any subsequent Selection Panel recommendations to applicants by 31 March 2023.

Open Call: People and Skills

This Open Call is focused on the People and Skills Investment Priority and is only open to eligible organisations that can design and deliver programmes within the period 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024.

Indicative funding for this call has been set to approximately £562,000 for 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024. There will be a separate opportunity later in the year for organisations to bid for another tranche of funding that will be available for the period April 2024 to March 2025.

Eligibility to apply under People and Skills Investment Priority Area, for Year 2 of SPF, is restricted, by UKSPF national guidance, to those organisations that meet all three eligibility requirements:

1. You are a Voluntary Community Social Enterprise’s (VCSE). Applicants will be required to provide evidence that they qualify as a VCSE. 
2. You are currently delivering an ESF-funded employability support programme or were delivering an ESF funded programme that came to an end following September 2022. Applicants are required to provide the relevant ESF Project Reference numbers.
3. There is an identified gap in provision, as a result of ESF funded provision coming to an end, that your proposed project intends to fill.

We have identified three ESF funded programmes, where VSCE delivery partners, may be eligible for funding:

• Building Better Opportunities
• Way2Work or Back2Work
• Community Grants Programme

Application process

This Open Call closed to new applications at midnight on Monday 6 March 2023.

We aim to notify the outcome of our initial assessment and any subsequent Selection Panel recommendations to applicants by 31 March 2023.