Can we defend and renew the case for local government’s commitment to dynamic commercial activity in the political and financial climate? About this event In the discussion to mark the launch of the forthcoming report by Human Engine and Localis, ‘Commercial Edge: renewing the case for the local investment state’, we wanted to seize the opportunity […]
As the government looks to give a more definite shape to the levelling up agenda through the forthcoming white paper, it is more important than ever to challenge and interrogate the concept, its origins and its goals. Discussions are warranted over exactly what “Levelling Up” will entail across the broad array of policy interventions it […]
A Localis / Social Value UK Webinar on transparency in the procurement world. About this event A free webinar, facilitated by Localis and Social Value UK The Green Paper for Transforming Public Procurement sets out to promote value and transparency at the expense of red-tape. As a principle of public procurement, transparency is to be […]
After successive one-year stop gap spending rounds, one occasioned by Brexit and the next by pandemic uncertainties, a long-term public finance settlement is as much desperately needed as it is unavoidable. But don’t bet the bank on there being another stop-gap financial settlement. To preserve the coherence of the local state, our councils need a […]
In the latest instalment of our ‘Building for Renewal’ programme of housing and planning webinars, Localis examined the role of the One Public Estate programme in unlocking surplus land nationwide for housebuilding. Established in 2013, One Public Estate (OPE) is a national programme delivered in partnership by the Office of Government Property (OGP) within the Cabinet Office […]
Writing in 1912, Hilaire Belloc warned: “change your hearts or you will lose your inns and you will deserve to have lost them”. Should such a calamity unfold, Belloc added that “you will have lost the last of England”. In our report ‘The Power of Pubs’ Localis looked at the attempts made in 2020 by […]
Last autumn, Oxford City Council commissioned Localis to explore the potential for stronger city governance and creative thinking to successfully address some of its myriad complex place policy challenges – including Covid-19 recovery response, inclusive growth both locally and linked to the Arc, transport connectivity and decarbonisation. As a coherent economic entity, Oxford possesses an […]
Good governance is important in ensuring good decision making and leadership in local authorities. Weakness in governance can have far reaching implications for individual councils and the people they serve. It is therefore important for councils to have a way to work through what good governance looks like for them, to understand how the risk […]
As visionary ideas go, the garden city movement as evangelised and then realised by Ebeneezer Howard, the founder of the Town and Country Planning Association, in Letchworth and Welwyn in Hertfordshire, remains among the more influential in our planning policy. Howard believed that out of a marriage of town and country would spring ‘a new […]
If the national challenge to get Britain back building is also acutely local, then to restore pre-crisis housebuilding levels – and the levels the country still needs – further action is required. Major developers will play a huge role in delivering these numbers over time, but for an immediate acceleration it is to the SME […]