£18m of funding for local transport, housing and skills programmes to be made available

The money will be spent on improving housing, transport and the skills of local people. The funding is being offered to Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, and Nottingham as part of early investment to the area, specifically targeting homes with poor energy efficiency ratings - the most poorly insulated - and low-income households.

£9.9 million is the latest funding amount to have been approved in order to help councils to carry out retrofit work on homes to make them more energy efficient.

David Mellen, Leader of Nottingham City Council, said: “I welcome this extra investment as part of our ongoing plans for devolution – especially the £9.9m to retrofit homes to become more energy efficient.

“This will not only help keep bills lower during the current cost-of-crisis but will also support Nottingham’s ambition to become a carbon neutral city by 2028.”

Devolution would mean a new guaranteed funding stream for the East Midlands region of £38m a year over a 30-year period and cover Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Derby and Nottingham, which is home to around 2.2 million people, making it one of the biggest in the country.

Baggy Shanker, Leader of Derby City Council, said: ““These schemes signal steps in the right direction, both in terms of securing much-needed funding – especially relevant for Derby, whose core spending power is the lowest in our region – and also decision making.”

Now the four councils have formally backed the plans, and agreed on a final version of the proposal, it means that new local powers and funding to improve the environment, skills training, transport, housing, and the economy could be in place as soon as next year.