Denbighshire levelling up funding bid to help tackle deep rooted deprivation provisionally successful

Denbighshire County Council’s project bid for Tackling Deep Rooted Denbighshire Deprivation through Pride of Place & Natural Environment has been provisionally awarded as part of third round Levelling Up funding. 

The project could potentially receive up to £19,973,283, to be used for a range of physical regeneration interventions in highly deprived areas of the Vale of Clwyd constituency to enhance the town centres, improve the sense of place and security, and support the visitor and retail economy to drive local growth. 

The provisional award of funding is for specific projects only, therefore the funds can only be used to support the activity outlined in the bid, and cannot be used to support activity that is substantially different to the parameters in the bid.

This means the Council is still facing the significant budgetary pressures that have recently been announced. It is estimated that delivering day to day services – including social services, waste collection and schools, will cost an extra £26m due to price increases, inflation, and pressure on demand. Despite an expected increase in funding of £5.6m (3%) by Welsh Government, this still leaves a funding gap of £20.4m for 2024/25.

Like all Local Authorities across Wales, the Council must find additional money through savings and efficiencies, charges for services, increases in Council Tax or by reducing or cutting services.

This bid was approved by Denbighshire County Council’s Cabinet on 14th December 2021 and was submitted in August 2022. UK Government advised us in It was announced in January of this year that this bid was unsuccessful. Therefore, due to the time that has passed since the application was submitted, there will be a short project validation check to ensure the bid will still benefit from Government funding, remains a local priority and is spent by March 2026.

Councillor Jason McLellan, Leader of the Council and Lead Member for Economic Growth & Tackling Deprivation said:

“Whilst I welcome the news, this one-off capital payment will not address the huge pressures our core services are under after years of austerity.

Due to the parameters of this funding, it will not be able to be used towards the significant funding gap that we as a Council are currently facing. Ahead of the UK budget announcement imminent this week I would call on the UK government to properly fund Wales.

The award is conditional, so I will be working with key officers to ensure that this achieves our aims in tackling deep rooted deprivation within our County.”