best practice guides and initiatives

Policy Exchange sent James Swaffield, one of the authors of its series of papers on urban policy, to investigate six different cities and city-regions in three different continents – Vancouver, Amsterdam, the Ruhr Area, Warsaw and Łódź, and Hong Kong. His task was to interview policy makers and local government officials, representatives of civil society and academics, as well as ordinary citizens, to find out which urban regeneration policies worked in these places – and why. He looked for common themes that would inform the debate in Britain.

Community empowerment is a defining agenda of the Brown Government, and likely to feature heavily in the manifestos of all the three main parties at the next election. The Communities and Local Government White Paper on the same topic, which is due for launch in July 2008, is therefore eagerly anticipated, by the local government community at least. In this context, this essay discusses how, despite community empowerment being presented as a panacea for many social ills, the evidence in relation to some outcomes is relatively patchy.

This report has been undertaken as part of the neighbourhood and community empowerment strand, which aims to accelerate understanding of how local authorities can, through their community engagement and neighbourhood working practices, increase the wellbeing of their residents.

This country’s rural communities cannot stand still. Change is inevitable whether development takes place or not, and the choices we make today will shape tomorrow’s character of the market towns, villages and hamlets that make up our countryside.

This report sets out a vision of flourishing, vibrant communities that will be genuinely sustainable – socially, economically and environmentally, and delivers a clear message: the planning process has to become an engine of regeneration or we face a future of decline.

New Local Government Network (NLGN) is an independent think tank that seeks to transform public services, revitalise local political leadership and empower local communities. NLGN is publishing this report as part of its programme of research and innovative policy projects, which we hope will be of use to policy makers and practitioners. The views expressed are however those of the authors and not necessarily those of NLGN

NESTA is the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.

Our aim is to transform the UK’s capacity for innovation. We invest in early stage companies, inform innovation policy and encourage a culture that helps innovation to flourish.

We have, with help of stakeholders and our other work, developed a good understanding of the key problems and issues that exist in the planning application process and identified a clear picture of the key themes that we need to focus on, in order to deliver meaningful improvements. Thus, we want to focus this Call for Solutions on how best we can address these key themes.

The guide, part of the Future Planning project, is the outcome of a collaboration between the TCPA, Rayne Foundation, Ethical Property Foundation and Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI). Focussing on how to deliver higher levels of community infrastructure through participation in spatial planning, the guide, researched and written by consultants Colin Buchanan, aims to help planning practitioners and developers deliver better quality development that meets the needs of the voluntary and community sector.

The Adapting to Climate Change Programme is responsible for the co-ordination of the Government’s work on adaptation in England, and on reserved matters only7. However, we need to ensure coherence across the Administrations, and take a UK-wide approach on cross-border issues. The UK Administrations will therefore be working closely together to ensure the sharing of best practice and cross-border co-operation.

This document outlines the Programme’s framework for action over the next three years

This document provides Planning Policy and Development Control officers within local authorities with the bare minimum, absolute essential information that they need to know about energy in the built environment. The document’s primary focus is to provide enough information to the Development Control officer to enable him or her to understand whether a planning application contains adequate information on energy and carbon emissions.

This document focuses mainly on residential development, but the general principles apply to all development types.