Urbanregen8

Combining the strengths of UMIST andThe Victoria University of Manchester

Urban Regeneration Managing and Evaluating Sustainable Communities

Lecture 8 Thursday October 30th 2008


PULLING IT ALL TOGETHER…

• Dry? Structural?• Too much Jargon?• Policy-speak etc….

UNDERSTANDING THE ROLE OF THIS FRAMEWORK IS• IMPORTANT TO YOUR WORK NO MATTER WHERE

YOU WORK.• IMPORTANT AS ACTIVE CITIZENS TO UNDERSTAND

WHERE DECISIONS ARE TAKEN


The Local Governance Partnership Architecture PRINCIPLES (PROBLEMS?) POLICY POWERS PRACTICE SUMMARY


PRINCIPLES (PROBLEMS)

Inherent tension and incompatability within core principles ;• Solve problems of inequality and poverty• Will not involve visible redistributionSo….• Creativity and innovation new ways of working• Partnerships and collaboration are good things • Managing Change to existing structures/people• Tightly controlled and demonstrable expenditure and value

for moneySneaking underlying feeling that local government itself is

part of the problem…


POLICY


POLICY STRAND 1 Regeneration Policy [Alphabet Soup]


POLICY STRAND 2 The Local Government Modernisation Agenda [turning round the tanker]


POLICY STRAND 3 Performance management measurement, audit and inspection [drowning in documents…]


Joined up government?


POLICY STRAND 1 Regeneration Policy [Alphabet Soup]

• Multiple initiatives

• Time scale

• Funding

• Target regime

• Area of benefit

• Delivery mechanism / model

• Thematic focus

• Client group

• Governance arrangements

• Partnership requirements

• “initiativitis”


HO PSA Delivery

PSA 5

PSA 3

PSA 2 (Joint OCJR)

PSA 1

PSA 4

PSA 7

PSA 6

One City Partnership

(LSP)

Notts Police

GOEM (43Staff)

5 Police Forces; 9 DATs;40 CDRPs; 49 Local Auth’s

ProbationPrisonsNASS ASB PolicingPolicy

PolicingStandards

CrimeReduction Drugs ACDCCU, REU, F

NDCLCJB

9 Area Committees

NOMS

CJS

OCJR CRCSG CommunitiesIND

NottinghamCity Council

Police Authority

Probation Inspectorate

CDRP DATCJIPCompact

CPS

HMICPrisons Inspectorate

Individual Regional Offices

Nott BCU

ProbationService

YOT

Courts

REGIONAL

NATIONAL

LOCAL

HMP

Voluntary & Community Sector


Tony Blair’s Approach - Government by task-force


Mission creep…

Growth of SEU membership (Taylor 2000)

January 1998 June 1999

• Civil servants 4 8

• Sub-central government 3 3

• Voluntary organisations 2 4

• Business 1 1

• Ministers 8 12

• Total 19 29


POLICY STRAND 2 The LGMA [turning round the tanker]

LGMA shorthand for policy interventions designed to improve (perceived) issues around

Efficiency

Accountability

Decision making Process

Finance

Functions


Tanker in First World War “Razzle-dazzle” camouflage


Strategic manoeuvring…


POLICY STRAND 3 Performance management measurement, audit and inspection [drowning in documents…]

Meanwhile elsewhere in WhitehallThe Improvement Agenda (close to LGMA but not totally connected) Empowered the Audit CommissionWaves of improvement BVPI – Best Value Performance IndicatorsCPA – Corporate Performance AssessmentCAA - Comprehensive Area Assessment The PSA Regime (Public Services Agreements)


Gordon Brown’s Approach – PSA regime


PSA match to ministers (2007)

• Figure 3 Number of PSAs for which each Cabinet Minister is operationally responsible.• Minister Department Number of PSAs• Ed Balls DCFS 5• Jacqui Smith Home Office 4• John Hutton DBERR 3• Hazel Blears DCLG 2• Peter Hain DWP 2• Alan Johnson DH 2• John Denham DIUS 2• Hilary Benn DEFRA 2• Alistair Darling HMT 1• Jack Straw MoJ 1• Ruth Kelly DfT 1• James Purnell DCMS 1• Ed Miliband Cabinet Office 1• Douglas Alexander DFID 1• David Miliband FCO 1• Harriet Harman Government Equalities Office 1


Local Government unmoved?


How not to fatten a pig…?


POWERS 1 : Legislative

• Decline of doctrine of Ultra Vires (beyond the powers) • Modern Local Government in Touch with the People 1998

DETR• Wellbeing Power of 2000 Local Government Act• Strong Local Leadership Quality Local Services 2002 DLTR• Your Region, Your Choice ODPM• Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act

2007 - Stronger and Prosperous Communities Local Government White Paper 2006

• Community Empowerment White Paper 2008 DCLG


Ultra vires


Parliamentary critiqueLord Greaves Lords Hansard 15 Jun 2006 : Column 379Perhaps I may conclude by giving a typical example of why that should be so. If you look on the

neighbourhood renewal unit website and do a Google search for "Neighbourhood Management", you will find a glossary to help you through the nightmare. There are 137 different things that you will have to learn about, ranging from an "Active Community Unit" until the last on the list, "Working Together Learning Together", which turns out to apply in Scotland only and is run by an organisation called Communities Scotland. The glossary runs through the "Building Communities Initiative" and the "Community Empowerment Fund". Of course floor targets and mainstreaming are absolutely crucial to the whole thing. So, if you want to engage with your local community, you have to learn about floor targets and mainstreaming before you get involved. The glossary continues with "Local Public Service Agreement", "Local Strategic Partnerships", "Locality Budgeting", "Neighbourhood Management Programme", "Neighbourhood Renewal Fund", "Neighbourhood Support Fund", "New Commitment to Neighbourhood Renewal", "Public Service Agreements"—which some people will know are an absolute minefield—"Sustainable Communities Programme", and so on.

Perhaps I may finally read out the public service agreements' definition: "Deprivation will be tackled through the bending of main Departmental programmes such as the police and

health services, to focus more specifically on the most deprived areas. Departments now have minimum targets to meet, which means that, for the first time, they will be judged on the areas where they are doing worst, and not just on averages".

In other words, everything that happens at the bottom has to meet targets, floors and all the rest of it, prescribed from above. It then says: "(See Floor targets)".

It is all top down. It is a well-meaning attempt to deliver the services but is profoundly undemocratic.


POWERS 2 : Extra-legislative.

• Role of legislation is minimal – can only “impose duties”

• Understanding why things are the way they are need to explore fine grain of institutional and organisational adaptation and to look at the extra-legislative

• Strategies• Concordats• Agreements• Guidance• Partnerships


So…

• LGPIH 2007 rationalised structures into a clear (if undemocratic?) structure

• Merging the quantitative experience of LPSA with the more visionary elements of LSPs

• Creating new duties and new statutory based partnerships

• Mainstreaming regeneration initiatives • Connecting in inspection regimes


Police

Duty on local councils and other local partners to work together to agree a single set of priorities through a Sustainable Community Strategy and a

Local Area Agreement

Three year delivery plan:Local Area

Agreement (LAA)

Council

Local Neighbourhoods

Local Strategic

Partnership

Long term Sustainable Community

Strategy (SCS)

Service Charter

Service Charter

Health Private sector

Community sector

Local Neighbourhoods

How it all fits together


Reinvigorating local regeneration through the LAA

Transforming Regeneration 2008

argued


How to link the strategic and the local

• Local Area Agreements


LAA Framework

Local Community

Local partners

National Priorities

Monitoring and

Reporting

OutcomesScrutiny

Sustainable Communities

Strategy

Funding

LAA

Enterprise & Economic DevelopmentHealthier communities, and older people

Safer and stronger communitiesChildren and young people

---------------------------------------------------

LAA Reward Grant

LSP


PRACTICE

• What does this look like? Different in different places…

• What does it mean for regeneration?• What does it mean for regeneration

professionals?• What does it mean for communities?


Local Sustainable Communities Strategies

• Formerly Community Strategies

• A key output from LSP work

• The 2020 vision

• Intertwine element of economic, environmental and social change


Manchester's 2006 SCS

• The 2006 SCS highlights key entrepreneurial concepts in its vision of Manchester becoming a ‘world class City

The interweaving of contradictory concepts

(Leary 2008)





Cornwall model


Wigan borough partnership structure


Summary

• Current regeneration approaches seek to merge strategic visioning with performance management

• Regeneration management Its VERY bureaucratic• Ghosts of prior regeneration are seen in new approaches• On the ground, poor communities have remained poor• The ONLY game in town is the LAA• The LAA tries to merge different logics of regeneration together• BUT…this is judged by the Audit commission according to

templates – which disempowers local government and local communities

• Making these structures work is now the role of regeneration professionals


3. Questions?

Presentations & Public Speaking

Urbanregen8