Workington is set to receive a major injection of Government funding of more than £20m, intended to help spearhead economic regeneration in the town.

As part of the slew of announcements made in the Government's budget, presented by the Chancellor Rishi Sunak to Parliament yesterday, allocations of funding worth hundreds of millions of pounds to towns across the country were revealed.

One of the 45 towns set to benefit from this latest round of funding settlements is Workington, which will receive £23m from the Government's £3.6bn Towns Fund investment pot.

This funding boost is set to finance a number of schemes intended to turbocharge economic growth in the town, including a project to create a "clean energy and logistics hub" at the Port of Workington.

The project would develop land at the port and on the adjacent Oldside site, with a view to attracting logistics and clean energy businesses to set up operations in a bid to grow the economic power of the Port of Workington.

This investment will also support the creation of a "community sports village" in Workington, and an innovation centre in the town that will offer new and growing firms flexible working space.

Workington's new funding injection will also be used to improve public spaces in Workington town centre and improve the town's connectivity.

The plans for this includes creating a new gateway to the town's retail centre at the junction of Oxford Street and Murray Road, as well as a redesign to Murray Road to improve it for pedestrians.

The Towns Fund investment will also finance a number of other schemes across Workington, which were decided upon by a Town Deal Board, chaired by John Coughlan, managing director of TSP Engineering.

As the lead authority for the funding submission, Allerdale Borough Council have long championed the value of the Towns Fund to Workington.

Leader of the council, Conservative councillor Mike Johnson, said the confirmation of Workington's successful bid was "absolutely fantastic news" for the town.

"We knew we had a strong bid which had support from the public and I’d like to thank everyone involved for getting to this stage.

"We’ll now work with Government and our partners to bring these projects to life and make the town an even better place to live, work and visit.”

Mr Coughlan said that the projects set to be funded by this £23m investment will be "really transformative", for both Workington and the wider west Cumbria region.

"I can’t wait to see them come to fruition," he said.

"The general public played a significant role in this bid with their support through the public consultation, so I’d like to once again extend my thanks to the good people of the area for working with us.”

Workington's Conservative MP, Mark Jenkinson, added that yesterday's announcement was "fantastic news", and added that this was a demonstration of the Government's commitment to the "levelling up agenda", addressing economic imbalances between the north and the south of England.

Mr Jenkinson added that this latest announcement builds on recent allocations of funding for the Allerdale area, including £11.5m from the Future High Streets Fund for Maryport and the "massive investment" from the Borderlands scheme, which stretches across Allerdale and the rest of the borders region.