The Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA) was, between 2016 and April 2025, the United Kingdom government's centre of expertise for infrastructure and major projects. The IPA reported to the

Cabinet Office The Cabinet Office is a Departments of the Government of the United Kingdom, ministerial department of the Government of the United Kingdom. It is responsible for supporting the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, prime minister and Cabinet ...

and

HM Treasury His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury or HMT), and informally referred to as the Treasury, is the Government of the United Kingdom’s economic and finance ministry. The Treasury is responsible for public spending, financial services policy, Tax ...

. The core teams included experts in infrastructure, project delivery and project finance who worked with government departments and industry. The IPA supported delivery of all types of in frastructure and major projects; ranging from railways, schools, hospitals and housing, to defence, IT and major transformation programmes. The IPA led the project delivery and project finance professions across government through the Government Major Projects Portfolio. It was superseded by the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA), established in April 2025.

History

The IPA was formed in 2016 by the merger of Infrastructure UK (IUK) and the Major Projects Authority (MPA). The IPA Chief Executive was Tony Meggs until July 2019, when he was replaced by Nick Smallwood. IUK was established in 2010 to support major infrastructure projects involving public sector capital; and the MPA was established in 2011 with a mandate to oversee and assure the largest government projects. In December 2017 the IPA issued the ''

Transforming Infrastructure Performance Transforming Infrastructure Performance is a British government report on the UK construction industry issued by the Infrastructure and Projects Authority in December 2017. Its aim was to improve productivity in the sector and make savings of £15 ...

'' report aimed at achieving annual savings of £15 billion per year in infrastructure procurement by increasing collaboration and innovation. On 13 September 2021, a follow-up report, ''Transforming Infrastructure Performance: Roadmap to 2030'', was published alongside the ''National Infrastructure and Construction Pipeline'' forecasting £650bn investment in UK infrastructure over the next decade. In May 2024, ahead of the

2024 United Kingdom general election The 2024 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday, 4 July 2024 to elect all 650 members of the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, House of Commons. The opposition Labour Party (UK), Labour Party, led by Keir Starmer, won a lan ...

, the Labour Party announced plans to merge the IPA with the

National Infrastructure Commission The National Infrastructure Commission was an executive agency responsible for providing expert advice to the UK Government on infrastructure challenges facing the UK, between 2015 and April 2025, when it was superseded by the National Infra ...

in order to speed up the delivery of major infrastructure projects in the UK. The new body would be called the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority. NISTA was established in April 2025 as a joint unit of the Treasury and Cabinet Office, with

Darren Jones Darren Paul Jones (born 13 November 1986) is a British politician who has served as Chief Secretary to the Treasury since July 2024, having previously been Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury from September 2023 to July 2024. A member of ...

as the responsible minister.

History

References

See also