diff --git a/tag_and_release.sh b/tag_and_release.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000..2a3c24c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tag_and_release.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,51 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+# Script to release a new version of the forwarder service
+# It does this by creating a branch named after the version, updating
+# version.py, committing those changes to the branch
+#
+# Usage:
+# tag_and_release.sh version
+# The version should be the semantic version for this new release
+
+if [ $# -ne 1 ]; then
+    echo "Usage tag_and_release version"
+    exit 1
+fi
+
+VERSION=$1
+
+SEMVER_REGEX="^(0|[1-9][0-9]*)\\.(0|[1-9][0-9]*)\\.(0|[1-9][0-9]*)(\\-[0-9A-Za-z-]+(\\.[0-9A-Za-z-]+)*)?(\\+[0-9A-Za-z-]+(\\.[0-9A-Za-z-]+)*)?$"
+
+if [[ ! $VERSION =~ $SEMVER_REGEX ]]; then
+  echo "Version should be a nice Semantic Version String (https://semver.org)"
+  exit 1
+fi
+
+verify_version() {
+  FUNCX_VERSION=$(python3 -c "import funcx_websocket_service.version; print(funcx_websocket_service.version.VERSION)")
+
+  if [[ $FUNCX_VERSION == "$VERSION" ]]
+  then
+      echo "Version requested matches package version: $VERSION"
+  else
+      echo "Updating version.py to match release"
+      sed "s/^VERSION *= *'.*'/VERSION = '$VERSION'/" funcx_forwarder/version.py > funcx_forwarder/version.py.bak
+      mv  funcx_forwarder/version.py.bak funcx_forwarder/version.py
+  fi
+}
+
+
+create_release_branch () {
+    echo "Creating branch"
+    git checkout -b "v$VERSION"
+    git add funcx_forwarder/version.py
+    git commit -m "Update to version $VERSION"
+
+    echo "Pushing branch"
+    git push origin "v$VERSION"
+}
+
+
+verify_version
+create_release_branch
+