ICE Insights Paper: what should NISTA’s priorities be?

The UK government has created a new National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA).

NISTA will merge the functions of the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) and the Infrastructure and Projects Authority (IPA).

In June, the government will also publish a new 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy and complete its multi-year Spending Review.

The strategy's success depends on the government’s ability to reduce the time and cost of infrastructure delivery and restore private sector confidence to invest in UK infrastructure.

How NISTA is set up, the functions it is given and how well it performs will be pivotal.

This paper examines what the government’s priorities for NISTA should be, what functions and powers it should retain from the NIC and IPA, and what it should add.

It recommends the following priorities for NISTA:

• Provide independent advice and challenge to the government:

  Ensure that an independent voice is part of NISTA’s governance structure to proactively challenge the government and ensure it does not shy away from difficult questions.

• Enable long-term strategic infrastructure planning:

  Build cross-party and cross-government support to enable long-term strategic infrastructure planning.

• Oversee a credible pipeline:

  Hold the government accountable for developing and committing to a prioritised, stable pipeline of investible projects aligned with society’s needs.

• Embed best practice and raise capability across government:

  Mandate the implementation of the Construction Playbook and Constructing the Gold Standard by government departments on a ‘comply’ basis, rather than ‘comply or explain’.

• Inform and engage the public:

  Ensure the public understands the benefits of infrastructure investment and that decision-makers understand the needs of infrastructure users.

• Engage globally:

  Retain the current IPA International function to continue informing and learning from global best practice on strategic infrastructure planning and delivery.