On 11 October my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister opened round 5 of the regional growth fund (RGF).

Under round 5 up to £300 million will be available to bidders from the private sector seeking support in order to fund high-quality projects and programmes. Round 5 will remain open until 9 December 2013.

The objectives of the RGF remain to stimulate private sector investment and to create sustainable private sector employment, particularly in areas dependent on the public sector. The eligibility requirements for round 5 have been updated to reflect our expectation that growth deals and the local growth fund are now the route for local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) to secure funding to pursue their business support priorities. In recognition of this, BIS will be making available an additional £100 million for the local growth fund in the period 2015-17. This will top up the local growth fund, already confirmed at the spending round as worth at least £2 billion for the whole of the next Parliament, with additional flexible funding to support the priorities identified by LEPs in their strategic economic plans. The local growth fund underlines the Government’s commitment to the devolution of economic powers from central Government to local areas, putting business-led LEPs, working with their local partners, at the heart of promoting growth. Hence round 5 is designed for bids clearly led by the private sector, although we hope that LEPs will still play a role in endorsing private sector bids from their areas.

Briefing events on RGF round 5 will be held across the country. The first of these was held in Newcastle on 11 October and more will follow across all the regions before the round closes. The events feature a presentation on how to make a successful bid and offer attendees the opportunity to ask questions. Businesses who wish to bid will also have the chance to discuss their application through an expression of interest meeting with a bid appraisal specialist from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

The dates and venues for the briefing events and expression of interest events are as follows:

Expression of interest appointments will also be available in London.

More information is available at: www.bis.gov.uk/rgf.

Round 6

I also wish to inform the House that the sixth round of RGF will open during the summer of 2014, giving companies across England a further opportunity to bid. I will announce further details on round 6 in due course.

Progress in Rounds 1 to 4

Contracting for rounds 1 and 2 is now complete. These projects and programmes are well into their delivery phase and, as reported in this year’s RGF annual monitoring report, as of March 2013 they had already delivered 20% of their employment targets. Contracting for round 3 is 98% complete and almost all of these schemes have begun to deliver on their jobs and growth commitments. Round 4 selected beneficiaries have until January 2014 to finalise their awards with BIS.

RGF has supported dozens of programmes throughout England. These programmes provide access to finance for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and are a key way of ensuring firms of all sizes can benefit from the RGF. Since April 1,300 SMEs have successfully received funding from RGF programmes bringing the total number of SMEs supported by the RGF to over 3,000. To ensure that demand from companies of all sizes is met, I have agreed with those national programmes which have received conditional offers in round 4 to increase the size of the grants they would be able to offer once their final awards are made in January, subject to due diligence. A new threshold for grants from these programmes means that companies can access grants of up to £1 million.

Further information on RGF programmes is available at: https://www.gov.uk/regional-growth-fund-a-guide-for-small-and-medium-enterprises-smes.