Written evidence submitted by the Joseph
Rowntree Foundation
THE FOUNDATION
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) is one of the
largest social policy research and development charities in the
UK. For over a century we have been engaged with searching out
the causes of social problems, investigating solutions and seeking
to influence those who can make changes. JRF's purpose is to understand
the root causes of social problems, to identify ways of overcoming
them, and to show how social needs can be met in practice. The
Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust (JRHT) shares the aims of the Foundation
and engages in practical housing and care work.
SUMMARY
— "What
Government is doing to support community led regeneration"
lacks detail and clarity, particularly in terms of the delivery
arrangements at local level.
— Beyond
promoting a more locally led approach it is not clear how lessons
from the past are being drawn on or how existing successful initiatives/mechanisms
will be developed.
— There
are a wide range of lessons that can be drawn from community based
regeneration including the need for a clear policy framework and
the need to tailor policies to capacity at the local level.
— JRF
is concerned that the proposals may lead to reduced levels of
integration of public funding and reduced co-ordination in delivery
at local authority and sub-regional levels.
— There
is too much focus on "people" and a lack of emphasis
on the importance of place-based interventions, particularly in
the most deprived areas.
— JRF
is concerned that incentives favour more prosperous growth areas
at the expense of more deprived places. This risks increasing
the gap between deprived and affluent communities and also risks
creating a spiral of decline in certain deprived areas.
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Our evidence base
JRF has carried out a wide range of research and
demonstration projects in the field of regeneration covering a
range of perspectives - economic, environmental and social, including
extensive research into community based regeneration. Our research
spans several decades, and numerous government approaches to developing
and delivering effecting regeneration, primarily focussing on
poor neighbourhoods. This submission draws on evidence (available
on our website) from a number of key research programmes including:
— Poverty
and Place programme (2008-11)—exploring the interaction
between poverty and location including recent projects such as
"Work and worklessness in deprived neighbourhoods" and
"Communities in recession".
— Transforming
Places: effective strategies for places and people (2007-10)—exploring
how we can better support the regeneration of disadvantaged areas.
— Policy
Analysis of Housing and Planning Reform (forthcoming 2011) undertaken
by the Town and Country Planning Association.
— Rebalancing
Local Economies (IPPR Oct 2010)—exploring how economic opportunities
for people in deprived communities can be widened.
— Action
on Estates programme (1992-95) looking at the role of residents
and community bodies in regeneration;
— Area
Regeneration Programme (1995-2000) taking a broader look at the
causes of deprivation, and at the role to be played by governments
at different levels;
— Neighbourhood
Programme (2002-04) tracking the fortunes of 20 community bodies
in England, Scotland and Wales.
1.2 Comment
In general terms we believe that the "Regeneration
to Enable Growth" publication underplays the importance
of the regeneration sector, and the contribution it makes to creating
socially and economically sustainable communities.
Also, the document lacks detail in key areas:
— No
attempt is made to define regeneration (and specifically what
is meant by community led regeneration) or explain why and where
it is needed most.
— No
analysis is presented of the current regeneration environment
and the key challenges it faces.
— No
evaluation is provided of previous regeneration policy and initiatives.
Beyond promoting a more locally led approach, it is not clear
what, if any, of the lessons from the past are being drawn on.
All JRF's work in regeneration confirms the view that a clear
knowledge of what has gone before, and of what currently exists,
is a key requisite for planning successful future work in communities.
These weaknesses generate a somewhat confused picture
and can be contrasted with the Scottish Government's recent regeneration
discussion paper (Building a Sustainable Future) which provides
a more comprehensive assessment of previous and current regeneration
initiatives and the future role for the sector.
1.3 Structure of response
Our response is structured around our evidence base.
It highlights key challenges to the government's proposals and
draws out important lessons, from research and practice, relevant
to the inquiry:
— Section
2—Transforming places and regenerating local economies.
— Section
3—Lessons learnt for community led regeneration.
— Section
4—Implications of proposed localism reforms for regeneration.
— Section
5—Concluding remarks.
2. TRANSFORMING
PLACES AND
REGENERATING LOCAL
ECONOMIES
2.1 Understanding the importance of place
based interventions
Current Government policy tends to focus on people
rather than places. The importance of place must be recognised
in all facets of government policy to reduce the risk of deprived
neighbourhoods being left behind. In the absence of mainstream
area based intervention, programmes must be used to drive improvement
in deprived neighbourhoods, especially those with concentrations
of worklessness.[45]
JRF's Transforming Disadvantaged Places programme
explored poverty and deprivation in the context of "place"
and regeneration policy. Research undertaken in this programme
made it clear that debates about whether to focus on place or
people interventions impose a false divide. The social equity
principles of sustainable development require effective, interlinked
approaches across social, environmental and economic domains at
all spatial tiers of governance.
The research concludes[46]
that a more integrated approach to tackling disadvantage, connected
across the different spatial levels of governance, and between
the different agencies involved in people—and place-focused
actions, seems to be essential for greater success in improving
the prospects of deprived places and the people living in them.
Deprived places and the people who live in them are not homogenous:
the labour market challenges posed by a highly stable, largely
homogeneous white population that has experienced intergenerational
unemployment in a former coalfield area are quite different from
those of an ethnically diverse, younger and more transient population
living in an inner-city area.[47]
2.2 The spatial dimensions of worklessness
and risks of residulisation
The Government's primary approach to tackling worklessness
is to make work pay via the introduction of the Universal Credit.
While this is an important component of tacking worklessness,
other key factors influence people's ability to take up work -
including vibrancy of local economy, availability and accessibility
of jobs, travel horizons, and mobility. Therefore, the single
work programme must incorporate resources to fund flexible and
innovative wrap around schemes for neighbourhoods with concentrations
of worklessness. Proposed initiatives geared towards increasing
personal mobility offer the potential to open up economic opportunities
to a greater number of people. However, such initiatives need
to be balanced with continuing effort to improve deprived neighbourhoods,
in order to avoid residulisation effects whereby certain areas
experience increasingly high concentrations of worklessness and
deprivation, creating a spiral of decline.[48]
Current economic development strategies focus on
economic restructuring and job creation, especially through inward
investment. But job creation alone fails to address the economic
fortunes of people in deprived neighbourhoods. The trickle-down
theories of the 1980s are long discredited by the persistent,
growing inequalities within urban areas experiencing substantial
economic success; London being a case in point.[49]
Understanding the function deprived neighbourhoods
play in wider housing and labour markets is also critical. Concentrations
of workless households, for example, may have their cause at a
wider spatial level and be linked to complex economic relationships
across wider sub-regions or city-regions relating to transport
availability and commuting patterns as well as labour markets.[50]
Cross boundary solutions are required to tackle these issues.
Local Economic Partnerships (LEPs) offer a potential vehicle for
local authority collaboration and it is therefore essential that
LEPs are able to access and influence the powers and resources
to drive forward sub-national economic development and that there
is a strong interaction between strategy and delivery at the functional
and neighbourhood levels. LEPs should seek to integrate work to
tackle neighbourhood deprivation alongside initiatives to promote
economic growth across their functional economic areas. It will
also be important for LEP's strategies and powers to develop within
an appropriate accountability framework.[51]
2.3. The importance of qualitative intelligence
in developing effective responses
Our research has also highlighted the limitations
of a purely statistical approach to identifying issues, barriers
and solutions to enhancing the socio-economic status of individuals
in deprived communities. Effectively monitoring change and the
impact of initiatives can also not be measured by statistics alone.
Developing qualitative intelligence is critical to informing effective
regeneration strategy (http://www.jrf.org.uk/reporting-poverty/experiencing).
2.4 Summary
Although the extensive tables appended to the "Regeneration
to Enable Growth" detail a range of resources
to be drawn on from various Government departments, the report
offers no clues about how these resources might be co-ordinated
or prioritised, other than to suggest that residents, local businesses,
civil society organisations and civic leaders (as opposed to central
or regional government) are "in the driving seat."
JRF understands that the Government is trying to
distance itself from the "command and control" mode
of previous administrations, which it considers to have been ineffective.
However, the proposed arrangements risk creating a void in strategic
planning and co-ordinated delivery. As evidenced above the co-ordination
of funding and delivery across the public sector and alignment
of this to private and voluntary sector activities is a central
plank of successful regeneration. There are also important spatial
dimensions associated with tackling worklessness, not least the
need to understand the linkages between neighbourhoods and the
wider functional economic area.
The importance of joined up placed based interventions—economic,
social and environmental—in regenerating deprived neighbourhoods
must not be underestimated. We are concerned that the proposed
"hands off" approach to regeneration may lead to the
residulisation of poor and vulnerable groups in increasingly concentrated
areas of deprivation.
3. KEY LESSONS
IN SUPPORTING
COMMUNITY LED
REGENERATION
3.1 Implementing a supportive framework for
regeneration
JRF's Neighbourhood Programme stressed the
importance of mechanisms that can provide support, advice and
appropriate resources to community bodies engaging in regeneration.
In deprived communities this support is crucial and will often
make the difference between whether local residents and their
organisations can participate or not. Support of this kind does
already exist and is provided sometimes by voluntary bodies, and
sometimes by local authorities. Recent stories in the media have
illustrated that key neighbourhood services are already being
affected by spending cuts, and that as a result jobs, skills and
also the volunteers supported by such work are in danger of being
lost. In order to rectify the potential losses to community-based
regeneration, it is suggested that ways should be found to ring-fence
funds for these support services, or at least to provide bridging
funds until alternative sources of funding can be found.
Community regeneration needs support from local and
central government. Lessons from the JRF supported Sustainable
Urban Neighbourhoods Network,[52]
JRF's Working in Neighbourhoods[53]
project in Bradford, as well as from much of JRF's research on
community-based regeneration, confirm that community empowerment
and community engagement, while necessary components of good regeneration,
are not sufficient in themselves. Such work does not thrive in
a policy vacuum, and needs support from players at other levels
of government. Local authorities and their partners play a key
role in setting overall priorities, providing an overarching framework
for planning, overseeing broader policy issues (for example the
appropriate location for new housing, transport, and inward investment).
National governments have a role in setting national priorities,
ensuring consistency and continuity of practice where necessary,
offering additional resources to deprived cities and regions,
and adjudicating on issues that cannot be resolved in localities.
3.2 Tailoring opportunities to the capacities
of community groups
The proposed devolution of powers has been welcomed
by some local practitioners, and JRF itself supports a sensible
reduction in unnecessary protocols, and the freedoms to experiment
and innovate that would flow from this. JRF does have reservations
though both about the nature and scale of some of the powers that
are apparently to be transferred to communities, and about the
ways that such transfers will play out in practice on the ground.
JRF research (for example its Action on Estates programme)[54]
into how to engage poor communities in the work of regeneration,
shows that this works best when the projects and responsibilities
are tailored to the priorities and capacities of community groups.
It works less well when community groups are directed towards
issues that are actually priorities for governments. The options
or powers for communities outlined in the CLG document tend to
be substantial (buying assets; running services; drawing up neighbourhood
plans; developing new housing). In practice, neighbourhood groups
are often keen to take on smaller projects: play groups; youth
clubs; helping older people with their gardens; or organising
sports activities. Activities like these play an important part
in regeneration, and are a good way of involving people in broader
issues. Although the CLG document lists a number of resources
for community groups, it says nothing about the importance of
encouraging such lower level but crucial activities.
All JRF research on community based regeneration
shows that there is great variability in the resources and capacities
of community organisations. A few are well funded and staffed.
The majority command minimal resources and are dependent on the
energies of a few volunteers. Some of the bigger and better resourced
bodies will perhaps be able to gear themselves up in order to
take on some of the substantial powers and opportunities listed
in the CLG paper. Others will not be able to do so, or will choose
not to. It should also be remembered that access to these new
powers is likely at times to be contested. A local group that
thinks it can deliver will find itself up against a larger competitor:
a developer, or a well-heeled local partnership, with more resources,
with dedicated staff, and also the ability to undercut the prices
offered by the smaller community body. In scenarios of this kind,
the bigger bodies may often win. This likely eventuality provides
a further reason for Government to use the words "community
led" more judiciously. Few things will disillusion communities
more than the realisation that these words actually mean "private
sector led" or "local authority led."
3.3 Prioritising or ring-fencing resources
for deprived communities
JRF's Bradford Working in Neighbourhoods project
has illustrated the difficulty of achieving open discussion at
the local level about how to prioritise the allocation of resources
between deprived and less deprived areas. Some of the difficulties
are political but others relate to the challenge of distributing
scarce resources in a fair way. In addition, the reluctance of
developers and other private sector bodies, in the current economic
climate, to invest in poor neigbourhoods without subsidy, is well
known. A likely scenario under the current plans is that regeneration
will tend to happen only in growth areas, prime city centre sites
and other locations where there is some prospect of profits for
the private sector. The danger therefore is that regeneration
in truly deprived communities will either be insignificant or
simply not happen at all. Research in 2009 by JRF[55]
confirmed that, in deprived communities, recessions bite deeper
and last longer than in other communities. The CLG report is silent
on this issue, and on what plans there are for those poor communities
which will find themselves unable to access resources for regeneration
in the foreseeable future. Government must consider ways of ring-fencing
resources for deprived communities to ensure that their urgent
needs are not passed over.
3.4 Sharing learning and best practice
"Sound analysis at all levels", JRF's national
Area Regeneration Programme[56]
stressed that successful regeneration is highly dependent on shared
analysis and learning, not just within regeneration partnerships
working at community level, but also within and between players
at all relevant levels: communities, localities, regions and national
players.
"Different capacities and the need for networking
and support" JRF's 2002-06 Neighbourhood Programme[57]
illustrated that capacity for successful regeneration and partnership
can vary very significantly between different localities. There
is an enduring need then for robust mechanisms enabling sharing
of practice and knowledge, as well as for offering assistance
to the weaker authorities. The current regeneration document offers
no suggestions about how such learning, networking and mutual
support might take place.
4. THE IMPLICATIONS
OF HOUSING
AND PLANNING
REFORM ON
REGENERATION—EARLY
CONCERNS
JRF has recently commissioned the Town and Country
Planning Association to prepare a paper on housing and planning
reform (forthcoming 2011). This raises some important questions
in relation to the regeneration agenda as outlined below.
4.1 New Homes Bonus
The New Homes Bonus does not have a direct relationship
with securing urban regeneration, and the Government has not designed
the mechanism to do this. However, the New Homes Bonus is of significance
to the way that major urban areas seek to renew their housing
stock through comprehensive redevelopment schemes involving large-scale
demolition and regeneration. Local authorities who have no net
housing additions will not receive the New Homes Bonus.
While the New Homes Bonus is paid for bringing housing
stock back into use, the likely effectiveness of this income stream
remains open to question. If urban regeneration funding programmes
from central government has been removed and council budgets are
cut, then meeting the upfront costs of bringing homes back into
use will be problematic. Given that the New Homes Bonus is not
ring-fenced and is paid in arrears, there is a reduced likelihood
of the income stream driving significant change. The model, providing
money which is not ring-fenced, is likely to be attractive to
cash-strapped local authorities, which presents a risk and even
a likelihood that such money will be spent sustaining core services.
There is also a risk that spatial plans would be modified to favour
higher value housing on easier greenfield site locations as apposed
to focused urban renewal.
The model is also likely to have an impact on regional
inequalities. The National Housing Federation has calculated that
the four northern regions of England could lose £104million,
while the five southern regions could gain £342million. This
is the product of an assumed blanket reduction in Formula Grant,
matched with the highly variable spatial delivery of housing units.
At the heart of the New Homes Bonus as currently formulated is
a regressive financial mechanism which focuses bonus grant on
areas of high market demand. While the New Homes Bonus may be
a powerful incentive for local authorities it does not provide
the source of any additionality which might incentivise local
people by improving local services. By top slicing formula grant
the New Homes Bonus reallocates monies which local authorities
used to receive, which has the affect of reallocating funding
from renewal areas with no net housing additions to councils with
high economic growth agendas, for example moving funding from
broadly northern metropolitan areas to southern districts.
Finally, the New Homes Bonus scheme must be seen
in the context of other financial instruments, such as planning
obligations, Section 106, and the Community Infrastructure Levy,
so that funds can be pooled in an integrated manner to deliver
community benefits and make the case for development. This requires
a degree of co-ordination to make the most out of the funding
pools available.
4.2 Affordable housing and regeneration
The "affordable rent initiative" will come
into force in April 2011 for new tenancies. This has significant
spatial implications in terms of the potential yield to social
landlords because the difference between social rent and affordable
rent varies in different parts of the country and therefore the
potential income from the new regime for landlords will vary significantly.
Estimates by the Chartered Institute of Housing show
that an increase to 80% of market rent (but limited to the new
local housing allowance caps) will allow Housing Associations
to generate an additional £1.5 billion pounds of borrowing
capacity and build 15,000 homes a year. But of those, only 358
homes (around 2%) would be built annually in the North East and
only 333 in the East Midlands, compared to 7,100 homes in London,
nearly half of the total supply for England, and 2,158 in the
South East. Therefore the use of intermediate rents to fund new
social housing appears to have a strong spatial dimension producing
greater yields in higher value areas.
North Star Housing Group, which owns 3,000 properties
in and around Stockton-on-Tees and Middlesbrough, has calculated
that affordable rent at 80% of market rent is just £13 a
week higher than social rents. Based on current re-let rates,
this would allow an additional rental income of just under £3
million over 10 years. The group says that even with discounts
through the planning process and factoring in expected extra borrowing
capacity, the new regime would only be able to fund an extra 56
homes over 10 years.
4.3 Benefit reform
In their formal response to Government the Social
Security Advisory Committee concluded that the net affect of the
benefit reforms would be "substantial displacement of the
poorest and most vulnerable households".
Further research by the Cambridge Centre for Housing
and Planning Research has concluded that housing benefit reform
is likely to have a profound impact on affordability in London.
The changes will mean an immediate reduction in the number of
neighbourhoods affordable to local housing allowance claimants
from 75% to 51% reducing further to 36% by 2016. The remaining
affordable areas are characterised by high rates of multiple deprivation
and unemployment. The research study concludes that "the
reforms will intensify the spatial concentration of disadvantage
in the city, and increase the segregation of poor and better off
households within London" (CCHPR 2011)
There are potentially significant implications for
the planning system as result of large scale social upheaval within
cities. In particular, sustaining urban renewal and striving for
socially and economically mixed communities may be compromised
by housing benefits policy which could lead to much greater social
housing needs in those areas already subject to significant deprivation
and disadvantage. It is less clear what the medium and long term
implications are for longer distance displacements of low incomes
households.
4.4 Planning reform
Neighbourhood Planning proposals are central to the
proposed planning reforms. Where they exist, Parish Councils will
have neighbourhood planning responsibilities, but in other areas
they will be granted to an ad hoc Neighbourhood Forum. Such forums
raise concerns about certainty and accountability. The process
of preparing Neighbourhood Development Orders risks being procedurally
complex and costly for both councils and communities. The Department
for Communities and Local Government estimate that on average
Neighbourhood Plans will cost between £17,000 to £63,000.
It is not clear from the Government's proposal how disadvantaged
neighbourhoods lacking sufficient resources will be able to participate
in, and benefit from the potential benefits of, the new system.
5. CONCLUSION
"What Government is Doing to Support Community
Led Regeneration" lacks detail and clarity, particularly
in terms of the delivery arrangements at local level. Beyond promoting
a more locally led approach, it is not clear how lessons from
the past are being drawn on or how existing successful initiatives/mechanisms
will be developed. JRF is concerned about the impact of these
proposals on joined up regeneration initiatives and the co-ordination
of public service delivery at local authority and sub-regional
levels.
In a period of huge transition (in terms of both
institutional architecture and funding etc) we are concerned that
the Government's proposals for regeneration do not place sufficient
emphasis on place based interventions. It appears that the anticipated
impacts and outcomes of the policy proposals on the most deprived
areas have not been fully appraised.
These areas comprise high concentrations of disadvantaged
and vulnerable groups with high levels of worklessness and health
inequalities. They comprise the most fragile local economies,
with limited opportunities for employment, low levels of private
sector activity and failing housing markets.
The issues faced by these communities require complex
placed based regeneration solutions. The proposed "hand off"
approach, incentivising growth and encouraging personal mobility,
will not address the socio economic and environmental issues in
many of these deprived areas; rather, it is likely
to contribute towards their long term decline.
March 2011
45 Rebalancing Local economies-IPPR-JRF-October 2011. Back
46
Transforming disadvantaged places (Round-up)-MT Associates-JRF-2008. Back
47
Devolution and regional governance: Tackling the economic needs
of deprived areas-North D, Syrett, S. and Etherington, D-JRF -
2007. Back
48
Rebalancing Local economies-IPPR-JRF-October 2011. Back
49
Poverty, wealth and place in Britain-Dorling et al-Policy
Press-2007. Back
50
Transforming disadvantaged places (Round-up) -MT Associates-JRF-2008. Back
51
Rebalancing Local economies-IPPR-JRF-October 2011. Back
52
Nicholas Falk et al Interim report of the Sustainable Urban
Neighbourhoods Network JRF forthcoming. Back
53
Liz Richardson Interim report of the Bradford Working in Neighbourhoods
project JRF forthcoming. Back
54
Marilyn Taylor Unleashing the potential: bringing residents
to the centre of regeneration JRF, December 1995. Back
55
Becky Tunstall Communities in recession: the effect on deprived
communities JRF, October 2009. Back
56
Michael Carley et al Regeneration in the 21st century:
policy into practice JRF/Policy Press, December 2000. Back
57
Marilyn Taylor et al Changing neighbourhoods: the impact
of "light touch" support in 20 neighbourhoods JRF,
March 2007. Back
| 
