New £20 million fund announced to support Greater Manchester high streets

Mayor of Greater Manchester, Bev Craig, has announced a new £20 million fund aimed at supporting local high streets across the city-region.

The Good Growth High Streets Fund will be made available to local businesses, business groups, and voluntary and community organisations across Greater Manchester to take forward ideas for improving their high street. Applications will open later this year, and will back ideas that can make a real difference to good economic growth and restore local pride.

To drive forward this work, Bev Craig (pictured in Middleton where the fund was announced on 10th August) is also calling on local businesses and groups to join a new High Streets Taskforce, which will help design plans and put them into practice across the city region.

The announcements are all part of Our High Streets: a new campaign, including other packages of support, that will run throughout the Mayor’s term to empower local communities to revitalise where they live, shop and socialise.

Bev Craig, Mayor of Greater Manchester, said:

“Our high streets are the beating hearts of our communities, and people want to feel pride about where they live.

“They are rightly worried and frustrated when they see derelict pubs, boarded-up shops and dodgy operators, and independent traders moving away. They want to see practical support for local businesses now. And that’s why I’m taking action.

“Our new £20 million Good Growth High Streets Fund is all about restoring pride in a vibrant high street – backing our neighbourhoods and spreading the rewards of good economic growth everywhere.”

The Good Growth High Streets Fund will sit alongside existing programmes as part of the city-region’s 10-year plan make Greater Manchester a great place to do business and ensure that economic growth in felt in all communities. Millions of pounds has already been invested through the millions of pounds through the Foundational Economy Innovation Fund, backing community-led innovations in the parts of the economy that people rely on for their everyday needs, including projects on local high streets, while a £2 billion Good Growth Fund is investing in regeneration schemes in town centres across Greater Manchester.