Research brief When Localis began thinking about this project it did so with the lofty ambition of wanting to do to Further Education (FE) what the Open University did to Higher Education (HE) in 1969. Whilst the radical intent remains, the dual threat of a squeezed labour market and rising labour costs means we need […]
Research brief Higher education institutions have a strategically important role to play in our economy. They are the centres of research excellence, the intellectual factories which turn out the UK’s most valuable export (its high skilled people) and they are anchored in a place, often with decades if not centuries of history. But their role […]
Localis, supported by the County Council’s Network, is currently undertaking a major new research project into local labour market influencing. It is impossible to maintain a vibrant labour market without an effective skills system. That we repeatedly attempt to do so suggests this point needs making. Politicians, caught between GCSE league tables and a myopic […]
Research brief No plan to solve the housing crisis is complete without lauding itself as radical. This year’s Housing White Paper describes its “bold, radical vision” to fix a broken housing market. The 2015 productivity plan included “radical measures to shake up the planning system”. A 2007 green paper promised “radical change” in delivering homes […]
Our new report, co-authored with the University of Birmingham, argues that, as part of its efforts to close the disability employment gap, the government should now commit to a sector deal for disability as part of its emerging industrial strategy. Despite a number of government-backed incentives for employers, still too few are aware of the benefits of […]
To some health and social care integration offers the ‘holy grail’ of financial sustainability. To others it is a way of moving the locus of care away from the acute sector and towards the community. A minority even suggest it is an attempt by one service to take over the other. Amongst the many rationales […]
The current mental health system is failing children and young people. Whilst in almost all areas of health and care reform the dominant trend is to encourage people to be more independent and resilient, in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), something has gone badly wrong. This report argues for reform of the mental […]
This short report is a response to the government white paper Fixing our broken housing market. Its starting point is that the white paper is a welcome strategy document which codifies significant and positive shifts in rhetoric. However what the white paper delivers in rhetoric it lacks in specific policy prescriptions. It identifies the parts of the system […]
This report argues that the government should reverse its plans to double the current amount of free childcare for three and four year olds of ‘working families’ to thirty hours. Instead, our proposals recommend that free childcare should be expanded on a means-tested basis providing low-income families fifteen hours free childcare for one year olds and an additional fifteen hours […]
This report makes the case for a locally-led industrial strategy. It argues that to turn a national industrial strategy into local economic renewal, places and their leaders should be provided the space and powers by government to lead from the front. In short places should take control of their local industrial strategy, with greater influence over the […]