Senior figures at Ofgem and within industry support giving the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) greater clout.
Ofgem director general, infrastructure Akshay Kaul told Utility Week Live that an expanded remit for the NIC would help with cross-sector infrastructure planning.
Environment Agency deputy director Gillian Pratt also called for greater cross-sector collaboration, while speaking during the same session.
They were speaking just hours before Labour unveiled its plans to merge the NIC with the Infrastructure Projects Authority (IPA) into a “new, powerful” body.
The new body will be called the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (Nista) and will be given new powers and an updated mandate to drive more effective delivery of major projects and infrastructure across the country.
Kaul said giving more weight to NIC recommendations offers “a big opportunity to make that system more joined up”.
“The NIC is a force for good in the sense that they look across sectors and they work naturally in a cross-sectoral way,” Kaul said.
“When we are talking about getting the right kind of collaboration and whole system planning for infrastructure then the institutional place to lead on that seems to me to be organisations like the NIC or the Climate Change Committee (CCC).
“The CCC clearly does have a lot of tract and the government takes their advice very seriously when they set the carbon budgets. It is less obvious how the NIC’s advice gets factored into government decision making.”
Kaul added that giving the NIC a greater remit in cross-sector planning would make it easier for regulators to collaborate.
“What is missing right now is a cross-sectoral policy framework which sets out how we are contributing towards a greater system of systems objective,” he added.
“If we had a cross-sectoral policy statement then one can see how you could evolve sectoral planning arrangements that all respond to that and you would get much, much better translation of cross-sectoral policy plans.”
Pratt added that “any way to get more collaboration across regulators and sectors is very much welcome”.
Labour’s plan has also garnered support from leading industry figures
SGN chief executive Mark Wild – who sat on an expert panel for Labour’s Major Capital Projects Review – said: “Going back to first principles of what works and what doesn’t will be critical.
“Creating an environment of long-term stability for business will help spur investment and encourage confidence that Britain can get building again. These reforms are long overdue and will make a real difference.”
Chief executive of the Civil Engineering Contractors Association (CECA) Alasdair Reisner added: “CECA has campaigned for many years to ensure that infrastructure delivery is no longer subject to party-political considerations, which often lead to short-termism and drift on projects that are essential to our economic wellbeing as a country.
“We contributed to the capital projects review that generated this recommendation, and therefore welcome its proposal to put infrastructure policy at the heart of government thinking. We hope that all parties will make similar commitments during the general election campaign.”