As the dust settles on the Autumn Budget, we take a closer look at the sectors receiving investment, along with the regions and projects that are most likely to benefit. For suppliers looking ahead to the new year and future forecast, we highlight some of the spend which could be contributing to their pipeline in 2025 and beyond.
The Autumn Budget proposes significant investment across several sectors, with construction, transport, and health and social care making up the key focus areas. £100bn will go to public infrastructure over the next five years for improvements to roads, rail, schools and hospitals, whilst the Department of Health and Social Care will receive an extra £22.6bn over the next two years to cut waiting times and deliver as many as 40,000 additional elective appointments per week.
Other headline investments include the focus on fixing potholes through an extra £500m for road maintenance in the next year, bringing the total amount dedicated to fixing England’s roads to nearly £1.6bn. Broadband and mobile coverage infrastructure is also set to get a boost, with over £500m of funding promised in the next year to drive progress in improving reliable, fast coverage across the UK through Project Gigabit and the Shared Rural Network.
🚧 | Transport
Sustainability is a key driver behind the Budget, which is reflected by the investment in public transport. This includes £1.3bn for City Region Sustainable Transport, such as the West Yorkshire mass transit scheme, and £650m for improving local transport across the country.
Additionally, there are plans to modernise and electrify key rail routes, such as the Trans-Pennine route, which will see some fully electric services operational by the end of 2024 and further electrification planned by 2026. Other proposed rail improvements include the East-West Rail project, with initial services set to begin in 2025, upgrades at Bradford Forster Square and Manchester Victoria, and the electrification of the Wigan-Bolton line.
Further efforts to decarbonise transport in 2025-26 will see £200m put towards accelerating EV charge point rollout and £120m to support the purchase of new electric vans and the manufacture of wheelchair accessible EVs.
🏠 | Housing
The construction budget is also informed by sustainability aims – at £3.4bn, the addition to the Warm Homes Fund is one of the largest allocations within the Budget. This will enable the transformation of 350,000 homes to be more energy efficient.
The £47m Local Nutrient Mitigation Fund aims to protect the local environment whilst unlocking the 28,000 new homes currently being stalled by nutrient neutrality rules. Other housing investment includes £500m in new funding for the Affordable Homes Programme to deliver up to 5,000 new homes.
The drive to deliver more affordable housing will work in conjunction with enhanced efforts to tackle homelessness, with an additional £233m taking the total spend on reducing homelessness to nearly £1bn in 2025-26.
🏥 | Healthcare
The Government has promised to “fix the NHS” and has set out several areas due to see an increase in funding, covering healthcare services and improvements to the NHS estate. Alongside the £22.6bn Department of Health and Social Care allocation for day-to-day spending, around £1.5bn will go towards new surgical hubs, diagnostic scanners and new beds, with the aim of creating more treatment space in emergency departments, reducing waiting times and shifting more care into the community.
£100m has also been earmarked to carry out 200 GP estate upgrades across England.
🤝 | Social Care
Social care will receive an extra £600m in 2025-26, though this boost makes up only a small proportion of the overall £24.5bn adult social care and £14.1bn children’s social care budgets.
Children’s social care is a particular priority, with pledges of £250m to test new ways of working, £44m to support kinship carers and foster carer recruitment, and £90m to renovate and build children’s homes.
🎓 | Education
The Chancellor has pointed to improving education as a priority for this Budget – a £2.3bn overall increase in core spending on schools will include £1bn for SEND services in an effort to fill funding gaps and address insufficient staffing.
The school rebuilding programme will also benefit, with £550m added for this year out of an overall allocation of £1.4bn, as part of the long-term strategy to improve schools nationwide.
🏛️ | Devolution and Local Government
The Budget is supportive of greater autonomy for Combined Authorities, with the first integrated settlements for Greater Manchester and West Midlands Combined Authorities set for 2025-26 and further settlements for other Combined Authorities due in the following year.
Another area of local investment is the continued support for Freeports and Investment Zones, including the newly-approved East Midlands Investment Zone – which will support advanced manufacturing and green industries – and the designation of five new customs sites at existing Freeports.
Councils are set to get a 3.2% increase in spending power for the next year thanks to an additional £1.3bn new grant funding for local authority services, together with council tax flexibilities and locally retained business rates. The Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government’s local government budget for 2025-26 will also increase to £14.3bn, which is equivalent to annual real terms growth of 10.4%.
💡 | Cost Savings
The planned investments will be aided by a 2% productivity, efficiency and savings target for all government departments over the next financial year, which is expected to save billions of pounds. This will be supported by an £80m investment to transform corporate functions across government, such as HR and finance.
Specific savings plans include cutting asylum costs by more than £4bn over the next two years and tightening consultancy spending to save over £1.2bn by 2026. This initiative seeks to reduce reliance on consultancy services from larger companies while creating opportunities for SMEs to contribute to the public sector.
The Budget provides a considerable spending commitment for the coming years, including a range of infrastructure and transport upgrades, increased health and social care capacity, and various construction works. With an increase to the local government budget and council spending power, there is potential for local opportunities across several sectors, as well as within NHS organisations and at a central government level.
Oxygen Insights pre-procurement gives suppliers early notice of government tenders and future procurement opportunities, giving you a head start over your competitors. If you want to increase your chances of winning work future work, find out more about Insights and book a demo.
