How can the UK remain a global leader in infrastructure?

2025 has been transformative for the UK’s infrastructure and built environment policy.

With the publication of the 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy (10YIS), the government has made a welcome commitment to ending short-termism, and unlocking the investment needed to improve productivity and resilience.

Last week’s joint meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Infrastructure and the APPG for Excellence in the Built Environment with the Minister for Industry, Chris McDonald MP, demonstrated why this long-term direction matters.

Bringing parliamentarians together with voices from across the construction, planning, and engineering sectors, the discussion highlighted the scale of the challenge and opportunity ahead.

A sector carrying huge responsibility

Infrastructure and construction impact almost every major economic and social ambition we set ourselves.

What emerged clearly from the meeting was a shared understanding that the construction ecosystem faces a series of connected pressures:

• Low productivity and the need for rapid technological transformation
• Skills shortages across core and emerging trades
• Underinvestment in climate-resilient and future-ready assets
• Complex procurement and planning pathways that delay delivery
• Fragmented regulation that fails to align safety, sustainability and efficiency
• Major gaps in transport electrification and connectivity
• Housing affordability challenges that undermine wider growth
• Ethical and environmental risks in global supply chains

These challenges are not new, but they are becoming more acute as expectations on the sector rise.

Construction as a driver of national growth

There is a wide consensus that construction remains one of the most powerful engines of economic growth.

Yet the country’s ability to capture this potential depends on how effectively we align regulation, investment and workforce planning.

There is urgency to addressing the UK’s persistent underinvestment in infrastructure, particularly in climate-resilient systems, electrified transport, port capacity and digital connectivity.

Without sustained and strategic investment, productivity improvements will be limited and investor confidence weakened.

Skills remain central to every part of the conversation

The sector will only deliver its growing list of responsibilities if the workforce is equipped to adapt to new materials, digital tools, and low-carbon methods with a forward-looking perspective.

A more coordinated national approach is needed, linking schools, further education, apprenticeships, and employers, to build a workforce capable of meeting future demand.

Innovation hubs, local decarbonisation programmes, and specialist training providers demonstrate what is possible when government, industry and education work together.

The challenge now is to scale this nationally, ensuring pathways into construction capacity building are clear, attractive, and well-supported.

Planning, procurement and the question of prioritisation

A recurring theme on the infrastructure sector is the need to improve procurement and planning systems so that they accelerate, rather than hold back, delivery.

While planning reform remains a long-term project, it’s important to discuss how to prioritise better, aiming to focus effort where the biggest gains can be achieved in a shorter timeline. This could help restore momentum.

The pace achieved during the pandemic shows what is possible when systems align behind clear outcomes.

The current system seems to consume capacity rather than unlocking it.

Planning and procurement frameworks must become more agile, less costly, and better aligned with long-term national priorities.

A systemic approach

Infrastructure does not exist in isolation.

Transport gaps, especially the slow pace of electrification and pressures on local bus services, are economic and social constraints.

Poor connectivity holds back growth, impacts labour markets, and limits the success of new housing.

Building safety remains a priority, with strong support for strengthening inspections and closing gaps that allow defects to persist.

Long-term maintenance is a strategic form of economic resilience rather than a cost. There is evidence that well-planned maintenance boosts productivity, investor confidence and value for money.

There are global implications to the UK’s ambitions to scale up its infrastructure delivery, from carbon emissions to ethical procurement.

It must ensure that materials are sourced transparently and responsibly, avoiding environmental harm and human rights violations overseas.

We must join the dots

The discussion reinforced a simple truth: the UK cannot deliver the homes, energy systems, transport links and digital networks it needs unless we treat infrastructure as a coherent system.

This means:

• aligning skills pipelines with national priorities;
• ensuring planning and procurement support, rather than hinder, delivery;
• investing in maintenance as well as new build; and
• taking responsibility for the global impacts of our supply chains.

Parliament, industry, educators and communities must now speak with one voice.

The choices we make today will determine whether we build a resilient, productive and competitive economy for decades to come.

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