Wales announces funding boost for everyday economy

The Welsh government is providing a new investment of £2.5m for projects which support the everyday local economy, improving services and bringing better jobs closer to home.

The new funding will support projects to help improve recruitment into social care and boost local Welsh NHS spending.

The everyday economy describes any jobs at the heart of local communities, across sectors including care and health, food, housing, energy, tourism, construction and retail.

The investment builds on the Welsh Government’s Foundational Economy Challenge Fund, which supported almost 50 projects to test new ways of making the everyday economy work better for all communities in Wales.

Projects selected for funding include £200,000 for Social Care Wales to tackle recruitment and retention challenges in care homes, and £500,000 for NHS Wales Shared Services Partnership (NWSSP) to enable the Welsh NHS to deliver plans to spend extra funding with local businesses and support the development of a plan to set out how NHS spending can support local economies.

Funding will also go to Digital High Streets to grow the digital capability of businesses in towns across Caerphilly, RCT and Blaenau Gwent by helping them set up delivery and click/collect services, and to the Flintshire Micro Care Project, with funding available for the local authority to promote the growth of micro-care services.

Economy minister, Vaughan Gething, said: ‘Throughout the pandemic, we have depended on the everyday economy more than ever.  We are committed to doing more to boost these services and opportunities to bring better jobs, closer to home.  Social care, food, retail and construction, are the pillars which have kept our communities safe and secure and our plans will help us strengthen those services.

‘Nurturing these sectors, which deliver the everyday goods and services that people across Wales depend on, is central to the Welsh Government’s economic recovery plans. The £2.5m funding I’m announcing today will help us back local businesses by creating new opportunities for them to grow and thrive.’

In related news, the health minister for Wales has welcomed more than half a billion pounds of new funding for health and social services in the country, to tackle ongoing costs of dealing with the pandemic and waiting times and recovery of the sector.

Photo by K. Mitch Hodge