Ministers in the Welsh Assembly Government have given the Heads of the Valleys Development Company, the team behind the Circuit of Wales, two weeks to show that they have enough financial backing for the project to go ahead.

If the £425m  track is completed it will become the home of the British MotoGP, with Dorna signing an agreement with the Circuit of Wales to host the event until 2024. British car manufacturer TVR also plan to relocate to the circuit in South Wales.

The two week deadline has been given by Ken Skates, the Cabinet Secretary for the Economy and Infrastructure in Wales. Six months ago  he asked the Heads of the Valley Development company to put together a new plan that requires the government in Wales to underwrite   less than 50 per cent of the project, after rejecting a 75 per cent proposal. Now Mr Skates has asked the team behind the circuit to 'make faster progress'.

"I am concerned that the Circuit of Wales project has been publically debated for many years without the team yet being able to raise the necessary private finance to bring the project to fruition," said Mr Skates, speaking in a Senedd plenary session today.

"The proposals have changed since 2011 and last July I made it clear what our position as a Welsh government is. I stated that we require a minimum of 50 percent of the capital and 50 percent of the risk of the project to be taken by the private sector, and should that happen we would consider any new proposal against the appropriate value for money and due diligence tests.

"I am keen to avoid the opportunity costs associated with a project that does not have a final end date, so I have therefore written to the Heads of the Valley's Development Corporation today asking them to make faster progress on this project, and asking for evidence to be provided to me  of named investor term sheets within the next two weeks."

At the beginning of January the Extreme Sports Company announced plans to put a BMX, skate and surf park, hotels, indoor skiing, trampolining, virtual reality zone, as well as music stages too, on the 36-hectare site near Ebbw Vale in the Welsh valleys. If the circuit ever gets round to being constructed then the first phase of the Circuit of Wales will open in 2019, with the completion of a bespoke 3.5-mile motorsport track designed by Populous.