Local government secretary Steve Reed has announced a £10m “Test, Learn and Grow Capability Fund”, which will be led and funded by the Cabinet Office.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government has also established a Place Unit, Reed added.
The new fund will support up to 20 places to try out new ways of delivering public services.
It will first be targeted at those areas already involved in the government’s Test, Learn and Grow Programme, with a specific focus on extending learning beyond individual local authorities and across sub-regions, through mayoral strategic authorities and clusters of local authorities working together. The fund will then expand to new locations later in the autumn.
Reed said the programme is "central to how this government is delivering services differently – putting people at the centre, starting small and building on what works, and empowering frontline staff and local places to respond to what users need”.
The government initially launched four "test-and-learn" trials in four areas across England – Manchester, Sheffield, Essex and Liverpool – from January 2025.
This was later expanded to more communities in England, including Barnsley, Wakefield, Manchester, Liverpool, Sandwell, Northumberland, Essex, Plymouth and Nottingham, with civil servants sent to work alongside local authorities and service users “to tackle the biggest challenges directly affecting local communities and people”.
A £100m "test, learn and grow" fund was provided for in the 2025 Budget in October to deploy the teams around the country.
The new Place Unit, based in MHCLG, will act as a convenor across departments, local stakeholders and community and place experts, “providing an advisory function to other departments, ensuring that place and community are considered in policy development and helping bring local voices into central government decision making”, Reed said.
Reed said its creation is in “recognition of the importance of place to outcomes for citizens and to the delivery of public services”.