Latest news with #infrastructureinvestment
BBC News
4 days ago
- Health
- BBC News
Jersey health minister faces questions over £350m investment plan
Scrutiny panel leaders have been surprised at a media interview given by health minister in which he revealed plans to invest £350m across the health service and in infrastructure chair of the Environment, Housing and Infrastructure Scrutiny Panel, Hilary Jeune, said her members had been asking for briefings and details of Project Breakwater, led by Tom Binet, in relation to infrastructure investment since December an interview, Binet proposed, under the project, to invest £350m which would be funded by borrowing or "dipping into savings".Jeune said the panel would hold a standalone hearing with the minister on 2 September. 'Concerning' She said: "This is concerning when we are waiting to scrutinise the spending of hundreds of millions of pounds of public money which is being used for key infrastructure projects, such as Fort Regent and the revitalisation of the town centre."How these are to be funded and who is responsible for these projects, such as where they fit into the infrastructure department remit, are key questions we need answered."Jeune said there appeared to be no cohesive strategy from the Council of Ministers about what the project was, who was responsible for its oversight and how it was communicated to States members and the public. She added the hearing would review the progress with the revitalisation of St Helier and welcomed input from Binet to see how these visions aligned.
Times
11-06-2025
- Business
- Times
What will be in the spending review 2025? The winners and losers
Rachel Reeves will unveil a £39 billion package today to build new social housing across the country as she pledges to use her spending review to 'invest in Britain's renewal'. As part of the government's pledge to build 1.5 million new homes by 2030 the chancellor will announce plans to almost double support for affordable home building. It will form part of around £100bn worth of new investment in infrastructure that she claims will create 'jobs and prosperity' in parts of the country that have been left behind. But she will also concede that 'too many people in too many parts of the country' are yet to feel any economic improvement in their finances, promising that the purpose of the spending review is to 'change that'. However, the increased capital spending will come alongside real terms cuts in some day-to-day government spending as ministers prioritise the NHS and defence for the bulk of the additional money being provided by the Treasury. So, who exactly are the winners and losers? Housing and councils Angela Rayner, the housing secretary Angela Rayner was one of the last cabinet ministers to agree her department's funding with the Treasury — but has come away with what ministers are claiming is the biggest boost to social and affordable housing investment in a generation. Under the plans the Treasury will invest £39bn of public money to build new council and social homes to rent over the next decade. The money — which equates to around £3.9bn a year — is significantly more than the £2.3 billion spent on the Affordable Homes Programme under the last government. Rayner's allies argued that building more council houses was not only critical to meet Labour's election pledge to build 1.5 million new homes by the end of the Parliament — but will ultimately save the government money. They said it would help reduce a projected rise in the benefit bill, due to high private sector rents, while cutting the cost of temporary homeless accommodation that is pushing councils towards bankruptcy. However the government has yet to put a figure on how many new homes will be built each year under the new scheme amid concerns that there is not the workforce in place to achieve the government's targets. Reeves is to put a £39 billion 'affordable housing' plan at the heart of her multi-year spending review, the Financial Times reported. The Treasury said the amount earmarked for affordable homes over 10 years represented 'the biggest boost to social and affordable housing investment in a generation'. Health Wes Streeting, the health secretary The NHS will be the biggest overall winner in the spending review, receiving a £30 billion rise in its day-to-day spending budget, making up about 60 per cent of the cash increase in the chancellor's overall day-to-day spending envelope, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. But health service managers are still warning it will not be enough to meet the government's ambition for reducing waiting time targets. In fact, Wes Streeting, the health secretary, initially asked for a real-terms 4 per cent rise in his budget but had to settle for a 2.8 per cent rise. There are also concerns in the department that although day-to-day spending will rise, infrastructure budgets will remain flat in real terms. NHS managers have long warned that it is hard to improve productivity in the health service when staff have to work in buildings that are not fit for purpose and with outdated IT infrastructure. Reeves has concluded she wants to target infrastructure spending in other areas, such as transport and net zero, where the government is more likely to get an economic return on its investment. The agreement is also complicated by the need for the NHS to pay more for medicines amid pressure from President Trump and to boost Britain's life sciences industry. The Treasury has refused to allocate extra funds, insisting that the department find the additional cash within existing budgets. Defence The other big winner from today's announcement will be the armed forces, which will see their budgets increase to hit the government target of spending 2.5 per cent of GDP on defence by 2027. The increase will be funded by cuts to international aid and will leave defence spending about £6.4 billion higher than if it had remained at the existing level. A key decision Reeves and Sir Keir Starmer will have to make today is whether to go beyond this and increase spending still further towards the end of the decade to meet the prime minister's aspiration of hitting 3 per cent of GDP in the next parliament, 'as economic and fiscal conditions allow'. The announcement comes before a meeting of Nato leaders this month, which is expected to agree to Trump's demand of increasing core defence spending to 3.5 per cent, accompanied by a further 1.5 per cent on defence-related infrastructure. No date has yet been set for when Nato members will have to meet this pledge. Schools Bridget Phillipson, the education secretary Ministers have already announced that schools will receive an extra £4.5 billion a year in core funding by 2029, in part to pay for reforms under which more children with special educational needs will be taught in mainstream schools. The rise includes spending pledges that have already been made, including the cost of expanding free school meals for all pupils whose families claim universal credit and the £615 million allocated to schools to fund the new pay settlement for teachers. But while this extra money may sound generous on paper, in practice schools will receive £1.5 billion each year up until 2028-29, when the cumulative increase reaches £4.5 billion compared with this year. Boiled down, this means the spending rise for education in this review totals a real-term lift of 0.4 per cent. Luke Sibieta, a research fellow at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said it was also unclear if the money included the teacher pay settlement reached last year. If so this would probably mean a real-terms budget freeze — although a shrinking school-age population means this would still result in a 3 per cent rise in spending per pupil by the end of the parliament. Energy and net zero Ed Miliband, the energy security and net-zero secretary Despite being among the last few ministers to agree their spending settlement with the Treasury, Ed Miliband 's department is likely to emerge as one of the biggest winners of the spending review as Reeves doubles down on Labour's clean-power pledge. Miliband will get more than £14 billion to fund the new Sizewell C nuclear power station, as well as a further £2.5 billion to develop a new generation of smaller modular reactors, and additional funding for carbon capture and storage. The energy secretary has also won out in a Whitehall row over the future of the government's warm-homes plan. The Treasury had looked to reduce some of the £13.2 billion earmarked for the scheme, which will subsidise households to install energy efficiency measures such as solar panels and insulation. Miliband is expected to get the vast majority of this funding in an effort to meet Labour 's pledge to cut household energy bills by 2030. Home Office Yvette Cooper, the home secretary The Home Office was the last government department to settle its spending plan with the Treasury after it was in effect imposed upon Cooper. Reeves has refused to meet her colleague's demands for extra police funding, despite warnings that it means the government could miss its flagship pledges on law and order and a public intervention by police chiefs who said they faced 'stark choices'. It is understood that police spending will increase in real terms each year of this spending review period, which ends in 2028-29. However, it remains unclear whether this boost will match the more than £1 billion that officers say is needed to cover existing gaps. • Early prison releases risk public safety, police warn Cooper is unhappy with the final settlement amid concerns it is not enough to meet the government's pledge to recruit 13,000 neighbourhood officers by 2029. The real-terms rise in police funding will also mean deeper cuts to other areas of her department. The Border Force has warned that any cuts made to its £1.2 billion budget could result in anything from longer queues at airports to threats to 'national security'. Environment Reeves is once again looking to farmers as she seeks to pare back government spending. This time the debate is over Britain's flagship post-Brexit farming subsidies, which appear likely to be slashed for all but a few small farms. Sources at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, led by Steve Reed, said that the subsidies, which financially reward farmers for sustainable practices, will be severely cut in the spending review. Labour will honour its budget promise of £5 billion in farming funding for 2024-26, so cuts would hit many farms from 2026 onwards. The package of subsidies was introduced to replace the European Union's common agricultural policy after Brexit. It is designed to encourage farmers financially to look after nature and the soil instead of rewarding them for growing crops or tending livestock. In future the scheme will be targeted at small farms, meaning larger, wealthier farms will lose access to funding for nature-friendly practices. Coming off the back of the government's decision to reduce inheritance tax relief for farmers, it is likely to go down badly with rural communities. Transport Reeves announced £15 billion worth of funding for local transport infrastructure, predominantly in the north of England and the Midlands. The transport spending will be focused on seats that Labour needs to hold in the face of a growing challenge from Reform. The focus will be on projects that will bring spades in the ground by the time of the next election. Reeves has told colleagues that she wants people to see and feel the outcome of the investment, which includes trams in Manchester and Birmingham, the Tyne and Wear Metro and a mass-transit system around Bristol. There is not expected to be money for big transport projects in London as ministers look to rebalance spending away from the capital. Science and technology The government has said it will spend £86 billion on the science and technology sector by the end of this parliament as it looks to support the tech industries to boost economic growth. The package will help fund research into drug treatments and longer-lasting batteries, and include up to £500 million for regions across the UK. Local leaders will have a say on how it is spent. While this may sound like a lot of money, the £86 billion figure is the sum of all government spending on 'research and innovation' over four years and the annual spend will be £22.5 billion by 2029-30. This represents a 3 per cent real-terms rise in budget in 2029-30 compared with the present financial year. Justice Shabana Mahmood, the justice secretary Three prisons will be built, starting this year, after a £4.7 billion funding commitment in the spending review in an attempt to grapple with the prisons crisis. The justice secretary Shabana Mahmood's speedy settlement was crucial as she was forced to announce plans to curb prison overcrowding when government projections showed that jails would fill up in November. The plans for 'record expansion' of the prison estate came alongside measures that meant offenders would spend only 28 days on recall to prison if they breached their licence conditions.
BBC News
03-06-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Water firm's losses deepen after Devon parasite outbreak
South West Water's parent company has reported widening losses following a parasite outbreak in Group posted a pre-tax loss of £72.7m for the year ending March, a sharp increase from the £9.1m loss recorded the previous year. A major contributor was the cryptosporidium outbreak in Brixham, south Devon, which cost the company about £21m, it increased water bills by 28% on average from April, which it said would fund ongoing investment plans. The parasite outbreak, which contaminated the local water supply, led to hospitalisations and more than 100 reported cases of illness, including symptoms such as diarrhoea. Pennon said about 800 staff and supply chain partners worked intensively over eight weeks to restore safe drinking water to the affected addition to the outbreak costs, the company also absorbed £15.8m in restructuring expenses over the the financial hit, Pennon said it was pushing ahead with plans to invest £3.2bn in its infrastructure by 2030. The investment will fund new reservoirs, storm overflow repairs, net zero initiatives, and service support this, SWW customers saw their bills rise by an average from April. Customers of Bristol Water and Sutton and East Surrey Water, also owned by Pennon, faced increases of 5% and 3%, respectively. Pennon said the bill hikes would cover about a third of the planned investment. 'Tough decision' "We know customers are worried about rising bills to fund this level of investment," said Susan Davy, chief executive of Pennon. "While we have made the tough decision to put bills up in 2025/26, for the first time in over a decade, two-thirds of our investments are being funded by our supportive investors and debt providers."Ultimately everyone will benefit from the investments we are making, from building reservoirs, to fixing storm overflows, powering our net zero ambitions and helping to create economic growth."Despite ongoing dry weather, Ms Davy said the South West was not expected to face a hosepipe ban this summer. Pennon said it anticipates a return to profitability in the coming year, driven by increased revenues and streamlined business operations. A landmark review by the independent Water Commission found the water sector in England and Wales is failing and needs stronger regulation to better protect billpayers and the environment.
Daily Mail
03-06-2025
- Business
- Daily Mail
South West Water owner's losses rise by £63million after Brixham parasite outbreak
Pennon saw losses widen last year as restructuring costs and the impact of the Brixham parasite outbreak weighed on the South West Water owner. The group, whose customers saw bills surge by an average of 28 per cent in April, posted a pre-tax loss of £72.7million for the year 31 March, up from a £9.1million loss the prior year. The parasite outbreak in Brixham, south Devon, which left some people hospitalised, cost Pennon about £21million, as around 800 staff and supply chain partners were dispatched for an eight-week effort to return safe clean drinking water to the area. Pennon also faced £15.8million in costs related to restructuring actions over the year. Plans to ramp up investment in infrastructure, and encourage customers to use less water to save money, also hit profitability, according to the group. Pennon is targeting £3.2billion of investment by 2030, incorporating work to build new reservoirs, fix storm overflows, meet its net zero commitments, and improve services for customers. Bills for South West Water customers surged by 28 per cent on average from April, while bills for Bristol Water and Sutton and East Surrey (SES) customers are rising by 5 and 3 per cent respectively. Pennon, which expects to return to profitability in the year ahead, said the bill hikes would help fund around a third of its investments. Susan Davy, Pennon's chief executive, added: 'We know customers are worried about rising bills to fund this level of investment. 'While we have made the tough decision to put bills up in 2025-26 - for the first time in over a decade - two-thirds of our investments are being funded by our supportive investors and debt providers. 'Ultimately everyone will benefit from the investments we are making - from building reservoirs, to fixing storm overflows, powering our net zero ambitions and helping to create economic growth.'
BBC News
22-05-2025
- General
- BBC News
Rectory Hill opened after water pipework installed
A main road in Guernsey has reopened after 12 weeks of Hill had been closed since 4 March while Guernsey Water installed 1,312ft (400m) of pipework as part of the development of a new main ring for the northern Water said the ring main acted like a motorway for the water next phase of the work, which involves installing an additional 1,640ft (500m) of pipework, has already begun on Route de L'Eglise, in Castel, and is due to be finished next year, the water company said. Carl Falla from Guernsey Water said: "The ring main is essential island infrastructure, with increased growth and development across the island."Failing to carry out this work now could result in pressure drops and even a loss of supply to thousands in future."He said the project was one of the largest new water infrastructure investments being undertaken by the utility company and was estimated to take between five and seven years to complete - at the cost of about £11m.
