We are fast approaching the twentieth anniversary of the formal establishment of the Greater London Authority. Offering strategic administration through a single mayoral figurehead, the GLA structure of governance has been woven, seemingly irrevocably, into the patchwork of the United Kingdom’s assymetric devolution agreements. As we ender the third deacde of the GLA’s existence, there […]
Taking back control means more than just transferring power from Brussels to Whitehall, it means placing empowered communities at the country’s constitutional core. Democratise, Decentralise, Deliver is a research programme of three separate but inter-related policy reports on community empowerment, national representation of local government and the incentivisation of goodwill through locally funded and controlled public services […]
Although the Covid-19 pandemic continues to rage across the globe stalling economies, incomes and mobility the crisis provides a chance to re-evaluate and re-imagine our collective future. Despite profound uncertainty about both the course of the pandemic and its long-term ramifications for society, decisions are being taken to address the national social and economic impacts […]
From the crises in elderly care and youth crime to the desperate challenge of building enough homes across the country, the need to properly fund, so as to properly deliver valued local services and infrastructure has never been clearer to the public. In this environment, the case for giving our local authorities greater powers to […]
In this essay collection Localis sets, in addition to its own analysis, twenty separate views from a wide range of individual experts and sector leading organisations asking how we might use the primacy of place to direct a return to housing growth, and with it, renewal as we emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic. In our […]
Physical assets act as centres in community life – be they local businesses, commons or high streets serving as economic or social anchors. Individually or collectively, these assets are hubs providing vital social infrastructure to support their local communities. Local Delivery looks at how communities have adapted and protected their social infrastructure in the face […]
In the UK, Covid-19 struck a country rife with regional inequality, already on the brink of major economic upheaval as part of the Brexit process, and deeply dividing along political and geographical lines. The effects of the crisis exposed longstanding issues – crucially with economic resilience in England’s regions and funding of public services – […]
The Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 was first presented to Parliament a decade ago, enshrining in law the duty of public sector commissioning to pay regard to economic, social and environmental wellbeing when making procurement decisions. In this time, the incorporation of a social value element into the assessment of public sector contracts has […]
A group of ten Conservative MPs from the 2019 intake has today set out an ambitious blueprint for the future of housing to rethink the social and economic role of housing over the next decade. The proposals are contained in a post-Budget essay collection entitled “Valuing Housing, Improving Lives’ and encompass how housing policy and […]
Local areas have seized the initiative on climate change. Two hundred and thirty local and combined authorities in England had declared climate emergencies by July 2019. The challenge now is for local policy makers to translate this momentum into co-ordinated action across all areas of their local economies, including energy, transport, buildings, land use and […]