One Public Estate (OPE) is an established national programme involving 97 per cent of councils in England and over 650 projects. Since its establishment in 2013 it has gone from strength to strength, supporting public sector partners to generate c£370 million in capital receipts, saved taxpayers £64 million in running costs, helped create over 23,000 new jobs and released land for over 14,000 new homes.
OPE is an established national programme, with over 650 projects, involving 97 per cent of local authorities in England, 13 government departments, as well as local public sector partners such as emergency services and health organisations. Since its establishment in 2013 it has gone from strength to strength, supporting public sector partners to generate c.£456 million in capital receipts, saved taxpayers £87.5 million in running costs, helped create over 31,000 new jobs and released land for over 19,000 new homes.
Our 72 existing partnerships work together to identify greater opportunities for collaboration to meet local and national priorities. Our partnerships cover combined authority, sub-regional and local authority areas. They are united by a common goal to create greater value out of their combined public estate through shared spaces, joined up services and releasing surplus assets.
OPE has shown how early stage support, using estate as a catalyst for change and investigating opportunities to collaborate across the public sector can deliver successful outcomes. OPE adds value by supporting projects which otherwise may not come forward, or by accelerating delivery of outcomes.
In 2017, the programme implemented a funding model that included a portion of sustainable grant, enabling the recycling of some awards back into the programme. Since then, OPE has distributed £8.3 million in sustainable grants and has continued to successfully recycle grants into new and innovative projects delivered by OPE partnerships.
With well-established partnerships in place across England, the programme is now looking to reinvest a greater proportion of funding to support more projects to come forward.
We will be awarding 75% of OPE revenue grant as sustainable grants, connecting a contribution back to the programme to a successful transaction or event during the project lifecycle; for example: a disposal, a lease ending, a co-location, or cost avoidance activity. We recognise that investing at an early stage means that not every opportunity can be delivered; where this success trigger is not realised, a contribution back to the programme will not be expected.
OPE recognises the investment that partnerships make over the project lifecycle through a variety of ways including project management, match-funding, and capital funding. In their applications, partnerships are required to outline the investment being made in the early stages of each project, which will be considered as part of the assessment.
Our offer
This will be OPE’s ninth application round. Our core OPE ethos remains – a locally led programme, bringing national and local public sector partners together to address shared priorities through collaboration.
As well as funding, we provide dedicated support from OPE regional teams to:
- broker central and local government collaboration
- advise on delivery and best practice
- help to develop your partnership and projects
- unblock barriers and act as honest brokers
- help champion partnerships, projects and initiatives
- access to government land and property leads to inform transformation
- access to regional and national networks of best practice
- access to a Pool of Experts framework providing specialist expertise
- access to national public estate mapping software.
More broadly, OPE provides a formal forum for collaboration across a range of policy agendas, with government recognition, participation and support. Our network of public sector professionals work together at local, regional and national levels. We target funding to develop projects which support national and local priorities, where that investment and partnership working is essential for delivery.
All eligible public bodies should apply for OPE funding and support through their local OPE partnership.
Assessment of OPE applications
All applications will be jointly assessed by Cabinet Office, the LGA and MHCLG on a competitive basis in light of advice from regional programme managers responsible for the area.
Bids will be evaluated by applying the following criteria:
Where the funding is over-subscribed we will take into account the geographical spread, ensuring the programme supports the Government’s commitment to level-up every part of the UK.
We reserve the right to partially fund grant applications and we may award a greater proportion of sustainable grant in response to OPE applications.