House of Commons - Office of the Deputy Prime Minister: Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions

Select Committee on Office of the Deputy Prime Minister: Housing, Planning, Local Government and the Regions Sixth Report

3 Local Services

15. We were struck on our visit to Oldham by the physical separation of communities as well as the lack of communication between them. Andrew Kilburn, the Chief Executive of Oldham Council told us:

"Undoubtedly people have talked about the nature of segregation in Oldham and the fact that we have particular communities segregated in residential terms. We clearly see that as an issue and we are looking for policies and programmes that will help us address that."

16. This was also reflected in Leicester. Rodney Green, Leicester Council's Chief Executive said.

"The major challenge for us is to break down those parallel lives and create these cross-links in our schools and in culture and so on."

Oldham Council argued that the objective should not necessarily be to overcome physical segregation but it concerned widening the perspective of local communities.

"The biggest problem we face is still the basic lack of understanding about the nature of different communities and the willingness of communities to be open and outward facing…..it is about whether they are outward or inward facing, and the reality in Oldham is that we still have communities in some areas that are inward facing rather than outward facing. In other words, they are not susceptible to dialogue and discussion and are not open to outside influences and to the development of relationships that are central to community cohesion."[8]

17. Many organisations are now responsible for promoting social cohesion. The Government recognised the importance of local agencies in promoting social cohesion. The Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 extended the responsibility to tackle discrimination, promote equality of opportunity and promote good relations between people from different racial groups. Orders published under this act require local authorities and other public agencies to prepare and publish a Race Equality Scheme. Evidence to the committee underlined the importance of local authorities being the focus of policies for promoting social cohesion. Rodney Green, the Chief Executive of Leicester City Council commented:

"The local authority is the single most decisive factor in leadership on community cohesion….. Leicester City Council spends about £650 million a year. If you understand that community cohesion is about housing, it is about culture, it is about economic performance, it is about faith issues, it is about housing and so on, the way that money is spent is bound to be extremely significant. That is why the City Council is the biggest key player. The second issue is to do with partnership. We are the key link to police, the voluntary sector, the private sector, on the local partnership, and if we are working well in partnership with them it is not just the £650 million spent; it is the orchestrating of the other spend that can be done in a way that promotes cross-community links or inhibits them. We have a heavy responsibility."[9]

18. There are concerns that local authorities are not given sufficient incentives to promote social cohesion particularly through the Comprehensive Performance Assessment. The Local Government Information Unit pointed out that race equality is not "weighted particularly high in the overall assessment". It added that

"social inclusion and community cohesion are not necessarily focussed on, unless they are identified by the local authority themselves as key community leadership issues."[10]

The unit urged that performance in social cohesion should be measured on a par with performance in education and social services without creating new, complex rules within the framework. It proposed that:

"Progress on the race equality scheme needs to be given more weight in an overall assessment, The corporate performance assessment should clearly probe whether the council in its community leadership role has assessed the social cohesion issues that are relevant to the local authority area and has developed a programme of action to address these issues."[11]

19. Councils need to reorganise their corporate structures to incorporate social cohesion issues. Oldham council told us how it had reorganised its management team to focus more extensively on social cohesion.

"We have moved to a position where internally issues around race and quality are that much more centre stage. There is a much broader training programme for all the staff. There are management development courses where community cohesion is a central element being planned, and we have looked at the way in which we organise a whole variety of other activities and, as the leader has talked about, there is the overview of scrutiny. We now have a Community Cohesion and Diversity Overview and Scrutiny Committee."[12]

20. Many public agencies now have the remit to promote social cohesion and are tasked with producing race equality strategies. Much more clarity is required as to what the strategies should comprise. It is unclear how they are supposed to be drawn up or implemented. There is a danger that the range of initiatives will be poorly coordinated and fragmented. Local authorities need to be given overall responsibility to coordinate their initiatives.

21. Councils need greater incentives to promote social cohesion. The Government should revise the Comprehensive Performance Assessment weightings to reflect greater importance to social cohesion issues and to consider a council's procedures for addressing them across all their operational areas. Councils should also revise their corporate structure to integrate social cohesion within their management structures and oversight and scrutiny committees.

The provision of local services

22. Local authorities are major spenders in their communities. Investment in schools, leisure facilities, and roads can have a very direct effect on jobs, social cohesion and the local community in general. One would expect a council to ensure that its spending enhanced social cohesion. During our visit to Oldham we saw insufficient evidence of that; and Council policies and community initiatives appeared to have been thought up and executed in isolation. The Council has been classified as 'poor' by the Audit Commission and was criticised by the Ritchie report. We are very pleased that much of the senior management team has been renewed, however we feel strongly that the Chief Executive, who provides leadership to both the organisation and the local community, should be able to justify the work done to tackle these very serious and demanding situations, and levels of achievement should be reflected in his remuneration.

23. The control of Oldham Council has changed hands in recent years. It is clear that all the political parties need to have a clear vision for the town, while recognising that councillors have a local duty to their wards. Their wards will prosper most if the whole borough is successful. All the parties need to have - and actively promote - a vision for a cohesive town which celebrates its diversity, as do many places in other parts of the country. The electorate in Oldham also need to look beyond local parochial neighbourhood issues. They must recognise that to enjoy a prosperous and enriched life, they need to support political parties committed to a thriving Borough in order to make sure the area is not again associated with conflict or extremist political parties and intolerant and bigoted views.

24. The locations chosen for council offices and other services can reinforce the segregation of communities and in some cases, bring duplication and the waste of resources. Evidence from organisations in Northern Ireland highlighted how public authorities pandered to the particular interests of different groups which has inevitably led to the duplication of services. Mary McCandless from the Northern Ireland Council of Voluntary Associations said:

"They took a decision that it was more important to get people to access the services than to try to teach them a lesson and force them to go somewhere they did not want to go and did not feel safe to go. It may be that there was a time when they could have taken a stand and said, "Sorry, this is where this facility is going to be and you have to make your way to it", but they made a decision to say no, we will put this here."[13]

Ms McCandless urged public agencies

"to pick their locations well and negotiate with the community."[14]

25. Local authorities and other public agencies need to develop a vision for the provision of services which ensures that they serve different communities. They need to choose carefully both the means of delivery and the location for new facilities to ensure that they are accessible to the various different communities in an area and do not pander to sectarianism. Any decision on the funding of a new initiative and the location of a new public facility needs to be tested to ensure that it will promote social cohesion and avoid segregation.

26. All existing central Government policies relating to the delivery of public services should be reviewed to ensure that, as far as possible the kind of public service duplication (and consequent institutionalised segregation) that has occurred in parts of Northern Ireland is avoided. All funding applications for new public facilities such as schools, hospitals, leisure/community centres, etc, should be closely scrutinised from a social cohesion standpoint. This scrutiny should assess any potential factors that might inhibit one or other group from using these facilities. The Comprehensive Performance Assessments of local authorities should look for evidence that they have ensured that all policy or funding decisions promote social integration and avoid segregation.

Measuring Success

27. Measuring the success of community cohesion policies in local authority areas has yet to be effectively addressed. The Home Office has introduced a biennial citizenship survey to increase its knowledge of what community cohesion is and the factors that influence it.[15] 500 interviews are to be conducted with local residents in order to capture how community cohesion is working at the very local level. More sophisticated measures are required. Stella Manzie, the Chief Executive of Coventry City Council, told us:

"I am disturbed by some of the national guidance, which even some of the local authority bodies, I am sorry to say, have signed up to, which suggests that surveys which ask people whether they have spoken to somebody from another ethnic community recently, whether they have spoken to somebody from another social class recently, can be used as an indicator of community cohesion. That seems to me to be going down an extremely simplistic route."[16]

28. We agree that the Government needs to develop more sophisticated measures to assess whether councils are promoting social cohesion. These need to be linked to Best Value Performance Indicators and the Comprehensive Performance Assessment. However, we do accept that it will always be necessary to ask local people about their views and believe that these subjective measures should at least form part of the assessment.

Open Discussion

29. An honest, open and mature debate on race issues is required so that trust can be built up and rumours dispelled. Andrew Kilburn, the Chief Executive of Oldham Metropolitan Council said that before the disturbances:

"There was a fear in many people of not understanding the issue and being frightened of causing offence. …(Since the disturbances) "We have had some very full and frank discussions, sometimes in open, sometimes closed. That is half the battle that we have got in this borough, that people do not feel frightened or threatened and that they can talk about some of these issues which are the concerns for them and their families."[17]

30. Councils need to work hard to create a climate in which people do not feel frightened or threatened and feel they can talk. The experience from Oldham underlines the importance for councils to promote open discussion about difficult issues associated with race.

Use of the media

31. Local newspapers, radio and television are very influential in affecting relations between communities or fermenting divisions. Local newspapers can exacerbate tensions in communities; they can also help to alleviate tension. There are some examples where the relationship between local councils and their local newspapers and television stations is being improved to ensure there is a greater understanding of the social and cultural issues in their districts and how they are being addressed. Councils have considerable budgets to spend on advertising which can be used to encourage responsible reporting. A Home Office practitioner group on the media involving representatives of national, regional and local media is drawing up guidance on mechanisms to help promote community cohesion which is expected to be published this autumn.[18]

32. Part of the West London Community Cohesion Pathfinder's programme is a project working closely with the major publisher in its area to help newspaper journalists understand the area where they are working and so to improve coverage of social cohesion issues. The councils in West London have set up a local officers' group for dissemination and communication and are helping voluntary organisations to "support better informed reporting by the mainstream media and get wider promotion of the positive work community groups are involved in and so help to dispel myths and misconceptions."[19]

33. The Committee heard from Nick Carter, the editor of the Leicester Mercury, who took the initiative in developing a monitoring body for community cohesion in Leicester. Mr Carter told us:

"It is about encouraging local authorities, in particular, to be proactive in talking to the local media as well, because without local authority involvement our role is that much more difficult."[20]

He set out in his submission the newspaper's approach to working with the local communities.

"The responsibilities the Leicester Mercury now accepts as a consequence of sitting round that table mean we work harder to look for the positives in our communities - particularly where they demonstrate that people from different cultures are living and working together.

We are more aware of those small groups of extremists who want to divide our communities and spread fear and suspicion. And we are better able to provide a platform for all the communities in which we seek to sell.

Inevitably, this puts more pressure on us to make those right decisions and it does mean we have to spend more time thinking about the consequences of everything we do."[21]

34. We were impressed by the drive and commitment of the Leicester Mercury. Mr Carter appeared to recognise that making sure the paper served the whole community in terms of advertising, reporting and editorial policy was good for circulation and profitability as well as being a key element in building a socially cohesive community.

"It may be easy to sell newspapers in the wake of trouble within communities, but that is a very short-term benefit, if I can put it that way. Fragmented communities contain people who are less likely to want to get involved in what is happening in those communities, they are full of suspicion and apprehension. In that environment, fewer people are likely to be interested in what is going on around them, and since we are the main provider of news and information about those communities we are less likely to have people turning to us for information. A cohesive community is a community which feels comfortable with itself, its people are involved in what is happening in those communities. They take a more active interest in what is happening, and therefore they are more likely to turn to their local newspaper and to other sources of local information to find out what is happening. On top of that, of course, as our communities change, we need to reflect also the changing make up of those communities in the sort of coverage that we provide."[22]

35. We understand the Oldham Chronicle is improving its coverage of the different communities in the town but it still seems prepared to publish unsigned letters in its correspondence columns, many of which express extreme views. In a society that is committed to free speech, such views ought not to be suppressed but those expressing them ought to have to put their own names to them. The black and ethnic minority groups ought to make much more effort to use the town's local newspaper. Whilst the Committee believes in free speech, racist letters should never be published, as the paper has a responsibility to the whole community and should not allow race hatred to be spread in such a way.

36. Local authorities need to take more seriously their relationship with the local media. They should be encouraged to develop a communications group among officers working on social cohesion to ensure that the benefits of their projects are maximised in the media and that any misinformation can be quickly countered.

37. The media also need to recognise their responsibilities and the benefits of promoting social cohesion. The new Home Office guidance on media relations should suggest that local authorities and other local agencies use their advertising and promotional budgets to encourage the local media to promote social cohesion by serving all local communities.

38. Local authorities and other local agencies should agree a local concordat with local media setting out how they will work together and a panel of representatives from both organisations should be established to monitor the relationship. The local media should take the initiative in establishing contact with faith and ethnic minorities on a regular basis and ensure that ethnic minority groups are represented in their workforce so that they have a fuller understanding of community issues.

Case Study: Opportunities for Women

Opportunities for Women operates two innovative services in the Oldham area which are to provide opportunities where women can explore, creatively and confidently, their choices within the world of work, and can develop skills to attain their new found goals:-

- The Opportunities for Women Centre - a town centre based facility, which offers a holistic service of information provision, guidance and training to women seeking to return to work or enter work for the first time.

- The Opportunities for Women Bus (Asian Women's Project) - a fully equipped double-decker bus that provides information, guidance and English training to women within Oldham's Asian communities who are seeking to enter work. It includes a fully equipped crèche.

Each initiative provides a first step for the target client group. The organisation works in close partnership with a range of other services and training providers to offer a holistic service to meet all the needs of women preparing themselves for work. This includes raising self esteem and confidence, and guidance to ensure progression onto training or into work.

The Asian Women's Project was established following research into why the numbers of Asian women using the OFW Centre in Oldham town centre were low during the first year of its operation in 1991/2. The project bus targets women who have only been in the country for a short time as well as women who have raised their families in Oldham and perhaps have been born and educated in the UK.

One of the key objectives of the OFW Bus is to integrate Asian women into mainstream provision by actively encouraging them to take advantage of town centre facilities and to make it possible for them to attend courses at the OFW Centre by paying for transport and childcare. Through arranged group visits as part of their training programme, these clients are introduced to the Job Centre, the Libraries, the Volunteer shop etc.

Throughout the 12 years these projects have been in operation OFW has seen a huge increase in the numbers of Asian women using the town centre facilities. A key lesson that has been learnt over the years is that this integration takes time and involves a careful development of trust and the fostering of confidence. It cannot be forced. Currently, OFW has large groups of Asian women attending IT training in the OFW Centre with bilingual support and integrated job search activities.

Both services are offered entirely free to women and financed by a variety of different funding streams including GM LSC, Jobcentre Plus, College Franchise and local funding initiatives.

Case Study: Oldham Community Fire Station

In the aftermath of the Oldham riots, Greater Manchester Fire Service sought to address the breakdown in communication, trust and confidence that existed between the various secular communities within the borough. Initially the brigade funded a single uniformed community cohesion outreach worker to develop a network of contacts within other organisations working in the various communities.

During this network development phase other national initiatives conducted by various fire brigades and external providers were contacted, in order to exchange learning outcomes and experiences. These included the London Fire and Civil Defence Authority, Merseyside, Cheshire Fire and Rescue Service as well as a diverse range of other public sector and volunteer providers such as Connexions, Groundwork Trust, Youth Offending Teams and Greater Manchester Police. All of these organisations were approached with the view to raising their awareness of the fire service's unique position as a communicator within a disparate range of communities. It also resulted in a number of small scale initiatives involving socially excluded and hard to reach individuals, all of whom had exhibited patterns of anti-social behaviour, nuisance, educational non-attendance or mistrust of existing channels of support.

The most basic project, (Firefly) is a spin-off of the provision presently offered by London Fire and Civil Defence Authority in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. This initiative has attracted enormous support from the Metropolitan Police and has been commended by various Politicians and elected local government representatives alike due to its ability to provide positive outcomes. Re-offending rates during the six-months following attendance on this project were reduced by 85% and provided a cost benefit far in excess of the initial cost of provision.

The Greater Manchester Fire Service programme, Fire Service Intervention Responding through Education to direct the Future Lives of Young people (Firefly) has the capacity to exceed this level of success, as it provides for a more diverse range of participants and tackles some of the most pertinent issues surrounding cohesion within and between communities. It also combines and provides for interaction between other tried and tested initiatives such as the Princes Trust and the Young Fire-fighters scheme.

Fire Service neutrality within these disparate communities provides the common thread for communication and facilitation of inter-organisational support, with referrals coming from those working within the disadvantaged areas, law enforcement liaison officers and members of the youth justice system. Local authorities need to maximise the role which the Fire Service can play in promoting social cohesion and ensure that it is involved in all initiatives otherwise a valuable tool in the challenge to improve cohesion remains under utilised.

8 Q250 Back

9 Q166 Back

10 SOC10 Back

11 SOC10 Back

12 Q283 Back

13 Q614 Back

14 Q616 Back

15 SOC26 Back

16 Q470 Back

17 Q282 Back

18 SOC26 Back

19 SOC72 Back