HS2 Community and Business Funds
Funds available to communities and local economies that are disrupted by the construction of High Speed Two (HS2).
The objective of these funds is to add benefit, over and above committed mitigation and statutory compensation, to communities and local economies along the HS2 route demonstrably disrupted by the construction of HS2.
A combined total of £40 million has been made available for Phase One of the scheme. The funding was launched at Royal Assent of the Phase One Act and opened for application in March 2017.
An announcement in January 2018 confirmed that an extra £5 million would be made available for Phase 2a (West Midlands to Crewe). This brings the overall total of CEF and BLEF for Phases One and 2a to £45 million. There is no fixed allocation between CEF and BLEF.
The additional £5 million for Phase 2a will be made available following Royal Assent (confirmation) of the Phase 2a Bill.
Groundwork have now carried out a review of the first 12 months of the funding programme.
Community and Environment Fund (CEF)
There will be two types of CEF grant:
- ‘CEF Local’ will focus on quality of life and environment in individual communities;
- ‘CEF Strategic’ will focus on large projects across several communities and address strategic rather than purely local concerns.
Business and Local Economy Fund (BLEF)
The BLEF will focus on projects or programmes across several business sectors and address employment concerns in an area as opposed to individual businesses.
Groundwork UK are the independent Grant Management Body for both funds.
Supporting information
Last updated 8 March 2018 + show all updates
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Link to annual review added
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Information added for Phase 2a funds
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First published.