PROJECTS in Cowdenbeath and Cardenden have missed out on more than £4 million of levelling up money.

The UK Government announced the winning bids last Thursday, with cash going to Glenrothes and Levenmouth, but there's still a chance they could get lucky in the next round of funding.

Fife Council had applied for £1.67m to help turn Cowdenbeath Town House into a community-run hub for training and business start-ups, and £2.79m to tackle flooding in Cardenden by replacing the Den Burn bridge.

Cowdenbeath MSP Annabelle Ewing said: "It is obviously a matter of real regret that the UK Government did not see fit to support the bid from Fife Council for financial support in replacing the Den Burn bridge – although I do note that Rishi Sunak’s wealthy rural constituency is receiving £19m, which must raise eyebrows as well as questions about how much actual ‘levelling up’ this fund is really designed to achieve.

“My concern is about what happens when water levels go up and the fact remains that the current Den Burn bridge is a contributor to the risk of flooding and work needs to be done.

“I have written to the chief executive of Fife Council expressing my hope that the council will, despite this disappointing decision by the UK Government, find a way forward for this project within the timescale that was previously committed.”

The council were committing some of their own funds for the £3.21m bridge project but needed the bulk of the cash to come from the levelling up fund.

The much-delayed announcement of second round funding last week saw £2.1 billion handed out to more than 100 projects across the UK.

In Scotland, 10 projects shared £177m.

Fife Council received £19.4m out of the £89.2m they applied for.

It's for the two projects in the Glenrothes and Central Fife bid, £5m to improve Riverside Park in Glenrothes and £14.4m for 35km of paths in Levenmouth.

From the £4.8bn in the UK Levelling Fund, £1.7bn was handed out in round one, £2.1bn has now been allocated in round two which still leaves £1bn to be distributed in round three.

At the outset, Scotland was promised funding of at least £800m.

To date projects north of the border have received just under £350m so a fair chunk of the remaining £1bn should be coming here, raising the possibility that Cowdenbeath and Cardenden could still benefit.

Fife Council leader, Councillor David Ross, said: "We welcome the news that Fife will receive £19.4m from the UK Government’s Levelling Up funding.

"The UK Government has indicated it will release details of a future round in due course, and we will look to submit applications for areas that weren't successful this time."

Only local authorities can apply for levelling up funds and the number of bids depends on how many MPs the local authority area has.

Fife has four, one bid each was put in for Dunfermline and West Fife, Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath, Glenrothes and Central Fife and North East Fife, and it is also allowed a bid for transport.

The Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath bid included money for Cowdenbeath Town House, the overall cost of the project is £2.17m, while the transport bid sought cash for the Den Burn bridge.