LEVELLING UP THE UNITED KINGDOM

Ailbhe McNabola, director of policy and communications at Power to Change, an independent trust that supports community businesses in England, finds out.

In February 2022, the government released its long-awaited Levelling Up White Paper. Like many other trusts and foundations that support community-led initiatives, we were keen to see what it would say about the role local people play in delivering the government’s levelling up ambitions. On that level, we weren’t disappointed: the white paper signalled an embracing of community power and a recognition of the important role that communities can play in revitalising leftbehind communities across the UK.

Alongside the expected emphasis on jobs and investment, and research and development spending, there was a welcome focus on community, quality of life and quality of place, social capital and wellbeing. The rhetoric and the analysis of the root causes of the problem are good. But it’s in the implementation where real success and real change will be delivered. Now that the shape of the government’s ambitions is clear, there are a few specific areas where we hope to see real progress being made:

For some time at Power to Change, we’ve been calling for a radical reimagining of who can exercise power in this country. With this white paper, it’s promising to see government starting to devolve funding and decision making out of

Whitehall. This is matched with an aspiration for this to happen universally across the country, not in the fragmented way it has so far.

But for power to really shift outside of London, decision making will need to take place at the most localised level at which it can be most effectively performed – the principle of subsidiarity. To limit devolution to metro and county mayor level is a missed opportunity that doesn’t align with this principle of subsidiarity. For levelling up to succeed, it must go further and empower people at a neighbourhood level – because local people are best placed to understand and deliver against the needs of their communities. The neighbourhood is, so often, the level at which decision making is most effectively performed.

So, while more (and more consistent) devolution to mayoral combined authorities or via county deals is a good start, it’s the commitment to pilot new models of community partnership, including community covenants, that we’re really excited about. These new covenants would see the local state and community working together to address challenges, enhance places and improve public services.

I’d like to see these pilots move forward urgently, for them to begin testing how this approach can be scaled up and given powers and funding over time. If it works well, then it could be the ideal local vehicle for deciding how the UK Shared Prosperity Fund allocations are spent. With mayors increasingly pulling powers down from Westminster, there needs to be a strong layer of neighbourhood governance that can work with them, particularly in the many places that do not have town or parish councils.

The white paper also commits government to exploring changes to neighbourhood governance, such as Community Improvement Districts which would give local communities more say in the development or regeneration of their high streets and town centres. At Power to Change, we are working with others to develop the concept of a Community Improvement District and are currently piloting this model with the Mayor of London, in Kilburn and Wood Green. We plan to expand these pilots to other places this year.

We have long argued that community ownership of assets, such as buildings or green spaces, underpins community power. The white paper recognises that the Community Ownership Fund (launched last year) is not yet reaching the communities that need it most. The white paper commits government to a review of how the fund is delivered –which is the right thing to do. The fund represents a huge opportunity to grow community ownership, so it’s important we get it right.

Alongside this, the white paper also recognises that Community Asset Transfer, and the listing of Assets of Community Value (part of the Community Right to Bid), should be looked at and strengthened. In 2019, we first called for the Community Right to Bid to be boosted, creating a Community Right to Buy that gives local people first refusal if a cherished local asset comes up for sale (see our Take Back the High Street report). We’re not alone in that view and still believe today that stronger community rights would complement some of the white paper’s moves towards empowering people in their local neighbourhoods to get involved in shaping their places for the better.

A final word on what the white paper means for a trust like ours, that is working to enable and support communityled enterprise and to grow the social economy to deliver better places.

Andy Haldane, permanent secretary for Levelling Up at the Cabinet Office, has described this white paper as the ‘starting gun’; the beginning of what will be a long-term endeavour. That much is obvious, I suppose. Deep-rooted regional inequalities such as those that exist in the UK won’t be shifted overnight. And our perspective is much less ‘macro’ than Andy’s, perhaps. We are looking at neighbourhoods and places that have felt neglected for many years. Where inward investment isn’t the easy answer to high street decline. Turning that around will require a concerted effort, letting go of central Whitehall control and empowering places to make their own best decisions.

Our work over the coming year or more will focus on continuing to build the evidence base, and make the case for, community-led development of place and an empowerment of local people. We will support pilots such as Community Improvement Districts and continue to work to support greater community asset ownership through direct support and through policy change.

We will work in partnership with combined and local authorities to develop and implement new strategies and ways of growing and strengthening their social, community-focused economies. We will soon launch a new programme of work with the British Academy, focused on the social infrastructure of the UK and how this contributes to addressing inequality and disadvantage. And we will work to ensure the government’s new Strategy for Community Spaces and Relationships, flagged in the white paper, draws on what many of us know about the importance of shared community space (social infrastructure) and the relationships that are built and sustained in those spaces. This was clearly set out in the white paper – now we need to see it made a reality in policy and funding decisions.

“Social capital and social infrastructure amplify the forces of economic agglomeration. Good housing, high streets, and leisure and cultural activities serve as a magnet for skilled people, meaning those places continue to steam ahead … The opposite dynamic is in play in left behind places. There, poor endowments of social capital and social infrastructure give rise to unsafe and unclean streets, weak community and cultural institutions, and poor sports and recreational facilities. This amplifies the centrifugal economic and financial forces impacting these places.

There is strong evidence these social factors are important drivers of agglomeration in their own right, influencing where people live and their lived experience in their communities.”