How will the CSR ‘New Radicals’ mix up an innovative housing recovery? – Tuesday 20 October from 11.00 a.m.
Planning for the Future – Policy Webinar
Tuesday 20 October from 11.00 a.m. to 12.00 p.m.
The Comprehensive Spending Review will be the first multi-year government funding settlement since 2015 and the ‘new radicals’ at the Treasury are seeking to improve funding decisions to get new homes, public assets and infrastructure built quicker.
Can their methods work and what help can the local state offer the Treasury in the realisation of shared growth goals?
Speakers include:
- Heather Jameson, editor, The Municipal Journal
- Cllr David Renard, chair of the Economy, Environment, Housing and Transport Board, Local Government Association
- Jackie Sadek, COO, UK Regeneration
- Richard Sterling, National Development Manager, Willmott Dixon
- Jonathan Werran, chief executive, Localis, (chair)
This event, jointly undertaken with the Willmott Dixon Group will ask how changes to central government funding and investment choices might benefit a more modern and accelerated build of new homes, public assets and community infrastructure over the next CSR period.
The New Radicals – can we get what we give for local housing delivery?
In a speech delivered 28 July, chief secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Barclay branded his Exchequer colleagues as ‘new radicals’ – determined to set a faster and smarter culture for driving governmental change and overcome slow and siloed systems.
The problems stubbornly remain the same – capital costs in the UK are between 10%-30% higher than in Europe. To answer this in the context of placemaking, a drive to digital and better application of data-science, modelling and analysis, are among measures that may help address failure.
The forthcoming review of the Treasury Green Book ,which sets a direction for investment choices and priorities, is set to make return on investment as much of a social and wellbeing decision as purely economic. This is a factor which will favour the levelling up agenda to rebalance the economy away from London and the South East to left behind areas and the ‘blue wall’ of Conservative seats won from Labour in the 2019 general election.
According to Mr Barclay, ‘Another key element of building faster is utilising modern construction techniques linked to clearer standardisation across projects.’
The Treasury view is that we as a nation would do well to learn from Japan and the so-called ‘dream factories’ where a single plant can deliver 20,000 units a year and customers can personalise their future home to match individual needs and desires. So in consequence the Spending Review will seek to accelerate national adoption of Modern Methods of Construction and link funding decisions to schemes that prioritise it.
So this webinar asks us to consider:
- how will the Treasury’s radical new approaches to speeding up projects, measuring outcomes, and using data to make better decisions drive improvements to building new homes, public assets and amenities such as schools and hospitals and deliver the connective infrastructure?
A recording of the event is available below:
Event kindly sponsored by:
