Planners, community representatives and people from the private sector – all experts in different ways – gathered in Tiverton on Thursday 17 February for an over-subscribed day organised by Empowering Communities with Creating Excellence, SWAN and Devon Heartlands Community Trust to consider the prospects for rural and urban communities in the new planning environment being created by the Localism Bill.
Chair Jim Claydon, a Board member of Creating Excellence and Past-President of RTPI, set the scene with a welcome for the Localism Bill and the opportunities it will offer. He had questions, however, on whether the reality will live up to many of the good principles behind it, and his mixture of welcome and concern was echoed by the speakers. Their presentations and other material is on the Creating Excellence website at this link, and more will be added. So this is just a discussion-starting sip of what they had to say:
The new Neighbourhood Plans were the focus of many comments. As Sylvia Brown, Chief Executive of ACRE said, with 142 powers in the Bill reserved to the Secretary of State, and so much therefore depending on secondary legislation, it’s hard at this stage to know how things are going to turn out. So it’s not at all clear how Parish Plans, and the processes which created them, will relate to the statutorily driven Neighbourhood Plans. And if things are being re-invented from the bottom-up,she added, “innovative alternatives need start-up funding. You can do more for less, but not something for nothing”.
As for what a neighbourhood or community is, planning expert Jeff Bishop said that while that may be clear enough in the countryside, what about urban areas like North Bristol, where he lives? The school community to which you relate as a family with children is different from the local community you feel part of for leisure or perhaps work. And the services you most use may be based in the community next door. What sort of plan can you make to cover the overlapping communities of urban areas? Jeff has recently brought together a new Localism Network, which you can read about in the conference report on the Creating Excellence website here.
Plans can be powerful though, and the day saw the launch of Carnegie UK Trust’s report The Power of the Plan. This sets out the findings of an analysis undertaken by Carnegie with the Eden Trust in Cornwall, the Devon Heartlands Community Development Trust and the Tipperary Institute in the Republic of Ireland. Kate Braithwaite, who led the work and wrote the report, outlined the vision that has been developed by the group for a simplified planning system with local people, not planning officials or elected representatives, in the driving seat. A vision that was developed further in their presentations and workshops by Kate with Paul Delahoy of Devon Heartlands Community Development Trust, and Ciaran Lynch and Catherine Corcoran of the Tipperary Institute. As Ciaran pointed out, collaboration is all – a note of warning for the proposal in the Localism Bill for local referendums, which he was not the only one to point out could lead to the volunteers so much needed in the Big Society being driven “straight back into the wood-work” when the vote did not go their way. And a local community divided is not a happy place.
Ciaran reflected to me at the end of the day on how he had enjoyed debate and discussions he had heard on his visit to England, and how positive he found the atmosphere. David Evans, Director of Planning and Community for West Dorset District Council, was a good example of that. His Council is a vanguard authority for piloting the new planning system, and one with an impressive percentage of parishes with plans. David is in no doubt of the government’s whole-hearted commitment to putting real power in the hands of communities when it comes to planning, and if all the details aren’t clear yet, that’s what he’s helping work through as a vanguard council. So questions are good, and his workshop invited its members to come up with their three biggest concerns. Which were:
- Will the Bill’s proposals, with the financial constraints in which they must be enacted, lead to just the loudest voices being heard, not the whole community
- How will Parish Plans link to the new Neighbourhood Plans?
- ‘No’ to referendums
What do you think? Do you look forward to the opportunities offered by the Bill, or are you more with the delegate who asked: “How can we be more like Egypt?” Please add your comments below.
It was an excellent event and I was delighted to be part of it. I hope the Irish experience was of some value but it is very heartening that in an age of centralisation real de-centralisation is an active item on the UK agenda. I do hope that good processes are developed and that the undoubted challenges that distributed and participatory decision-making offer are responded to creatively, with honesty and with mutual respect. If those who took part in the Tiverton event are a good cross-sammple I would have great hopes.
ReplyDeleteI was very plesed to be part of such a positive event and to meet so many intersting people from varied backgrounds. While the localism agenda is indeed fraught and daunting it provides a great opportunity for dialogue and exchange between pratitioners. It will be difficult for a government to ignore such voices if they want Localism to work!
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