Future Transport Investment in the North: A briefing on the government’s new regional analysis of the National Infrastructure and Construction Pipeline

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IPPR North commends the IPA for responding to our frequent calls to improve the available data on regional infrastructure and accepting the argument that it is important to disaggregate public spending on a regional, per capita basis.

We support some of the assumptions made in the new regional analysis including the importance of allocating ‘national’ projects, including HS2, across different regions and excluding private-only investments.

However, there are a number of assumptions which may have been applied accurately but manage to disregard large amounts spent in London and many people might consider misleading. Based on the new data available through the latest pipeline and our consideration of the methodological assumptions made by the IPA, IPPR North has been able to carry out its own new analysis of the regional figures.

For those who take an interest in the detail of transport spending we hope this briefing helps to elaborate the different methodological issues at stake when it comes to making regional comparisons.

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