Give local leaders more control over regeneration, says think tank

The next government must give local leaders greater economic powers and financial control over regeneration to boost housebuilding and long-term local economic growth, the Localis think tank has said.

Its report 'Design for life – the smart regeneration journey to 2030’ looked at ‘five pillars’ to attaining successful regeneration: place leadership; financial capacity; net zero and climate change; the role of the private and third sectors; the role of health and wellbeing.

Localis called for a return to regional spatial planning and establishment of regional planning offices to support this.

There should also be an end to the revenue/capital funding split in local authorities, it said.

Instead, there would be a single budget for local authorities with a separate regeneration account – run on a similar basis to the housing revenue account - which the think tank said would more efficiently allocate capital for regeneration.

It said councils should then be able to use regeneration as tool to leverage capital funds for retrofit and climate resilience measures and for energy-proofing the housing stock.

Localis, which is chaired by Sir Merrick Cockell, the former Conservative chair of the Local Government Association, also urged increased involvement of the private and third sectors in community housing initiatives in particular for small-scale development within regeneration projects.

Whitehall should work with health services and local government to  promote community-driven healthcare in urban centres that could also inform local and subregional plans, it argued.

Chief executive Jonathan Werran said: “In the next political cycle, the vexing problem of improving the public realm in a situation of parlous public finances will keep regeneration of our towns and cities as an economic and political imperative.”

Werran added that it was “important to understand both how pressing concerns for our councils undertaking regeneration projects can be addressed, and how the current position has been arrived at through recent decades of central government policy”.

Mark Smulian