Transcript Slide 1

Terrie Alafat
Director, Housing Growth, Markets and
Strategy
The Government’s view
Mutual Housing Event
Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors
19 November 2010
The Big Society vision
“The Big Society is about a huge culture change
where people, in their everyday lives….feel both
free and powerful enough to help themselves and
their own communities” David Cameron, 19 July
Principles
Values
Freedom
Frameworks that
support social
responsibility and civil
liberties
Fairness
Those who cannot, we
always help
A Big
Society
matched by
Big Citizens
Social action
What people can do
for each other
Community
empowerment
How people can help
themselves
Public service reform
Responsibility
What the state can
do for people
Those who can, do
Methods
Decentralisation
Transparency
Providing finance
Definitions
Is the ethos…
Localism
Doing everything at the lowest possible level
and only involving central government if
absolutely necessary
Is what we do…
Decentralisation
Giving away power to individuals,
professionals, communities and local
institutions
Is what we’re trying to achieve…
Big Society
A society where people, neighbourhoods
and communities have more power and
responsibility and use it to create better
services and outcomes.
The Big Story
•
“Localism isn't simply about giving power
back to local government. We will push
power downwards and outwards to the
lowest possible level - so that power is held
by local people. People want more for less
in their services and we will free up councils
to make that happen.” Eric Pickles
Shift toward local accountability
“We need to give people the platform to get things
done ….. a system which properly puts tenants and
their representatives firmly in the driving
seat…..that’s what I call real tenant empowerment”
Grant Shapps, CIH Conference, July 2010
Housing commitments
•
Publish a paper setting out the Government’s plans for social
housing
•
Introduce an affordable rent scheme.
•
Introduce the Community Right to Build, allowing communities to
take forward their own plans for development
•
Increase mobility amongst social housing tenants to make social
housing more flexible
•
Provide a strong incentive for local authorities to build new homes in
the form of a New Homes Bonus.
.
Other commitments of interest…
•
Giving every neighbourhood the chance to shape its own
development through the creation of neighbourhood plans
•
Giving communities the right to save local facilities threatened
with closure
•
Giving communities the right to bid to take over local state-run
services
•
And on Wednesday Francis Maude launched the new rights
and support for staff mutuals for public sector workers
Neighbourhood Plans
•Every neighbourhood will be given the chance to shape its own
development through the creation of neighbourhood plans
•These will give local communities greater flexibility and the
freedom to bring forward more development than set out in the
local authority plan.
•Neighbourhood plans will need to respect the overall national
presumption in favour of sustainable development, as well as
other local strategic priorities such as the positioning of transport
links and meeting housing need
Community Right to Build
•
Proposals to be set out in Localism Bill to be introduced
shortly
•
Empowering communities to bring forward development they
want
•
Supporting community-led development proposals
•
Maintaining benefit of development locally
•
Light-touch, streamlined process
•
Community referendum to ensure local support for proposals
•
Support arrangements to advise and help community groups
get proposals off the ground
Regulatory changes
•Regulation will also reflect the principles of localism and decentralisation:
•
Regulator remains focused on proactive economic regulation –
maintaining lender confidence and protecting the tax payer. This is
its primary role
•
And regulator will continue to set clear standards on economic and
consumer matters and respond to serious failures against them
•
But a new localist approach to consumer regulation – with greater
landlord accountability to tenants
•
Emphasis on landlords agreeing with tenants the information
tenants need to judge performance and hold landlords to account
•
Landlords will be encouraged to facilitate development of tenant
panels
•
And local mechanisms will be used to address routine problems,
with an enhanced role for elected Councillors, MPs and tenant
panels in the complaints process.
What can tenants do?
• Social Housing Tenants who play an active role in their estates
already exemplify the benefits of localism - making a real
difference to their communities
• The new shape of regulation gives more opportunities to drive
involvement at local level. Tenants can :
•Get involved in scrutinising the activities of landlords, and
working with them to drive up service standards .
•Come together to form a tenant panel in collaboration with their
landlords
• We in DCLG are working closely with the National Tenant
Organisations to develop and drive this work.
What can you do?
•
•Get involved in discussions on the Localism Bill
•Continue to work with Local Authorities to identify land
•Make connections with the developing Housing
Associations
•Continue your good work on tenant participation – one
of the keys to the Big Society