The Voice of Authority:
What does recovery look like for the UK’s core cities?
In partnership with:
21 May 2020 Post webinar report
Post Webinar Report What does recovery look like for the UK’s core cities? 21 May 2020
In partnership with: Chair: Toby Fox Managing director, 3Fox Panelists Marvin Rees
Ken Nettleship
Mayor of Bristol
Business expansion specialist, Invest in Nottingham
Chris Murray
Olaide Oboh
Director, Core Cities UK
Director of partnerships, First Base
OVERVIEW The discussion ranged widely and this report contains a sample and summary. Watch the webinar in full at thevoiceofauthority.co.uk, and subscribe to stay updated on future episodes.
Post Webinar Report DISCUSSION SUMMARY There are eleven cities in the Core Cities group - taken together they contribute 26% of the GDP of the UK. Bristol and Nottingham were represented by Mayor Marvin Rees and Ken Nettleship respectively, while Chris Murray of the Core Cities group spoke for the remaining nine. Olaide Oboh of mixed-use developer First Base represented the private sector in the discussion. Right off the block, Mayor Rees addressed the “elephant in the room” – the mixed messaging coming from government. “At the beginning we were told… do whatever you need to do to tackle this pandemic, and we will cover the cost. Since then, that’s proved not to be as strong a promise as it initially sounded.” Bristol have faced an estimated £29 million pound increase in costs throughout the pandemic, and are anticipating an £83 million pound hit to local government. Similar situations face all of the core cities – Chris Murray put the deficit for the English Core Cites as a direct result of Covid-19 at a figure of approximately £2 billion pounds. Bristol is proud of the relationship it has built with developers, and its reputation for a bit of a “can do attitude” but Mayor Rees worried that this might come under strain in the months to come. Rees also reminded the audience to think of the social implications of Covid-19, and the actions being taken to control its spread. He listed mental health, compounding educational inequalities, and domestic violence amongst others in this regard.
“Looking at cities I’ve worked in over the years, a lot of developments have almost been dropped in in isolation of each other, and haven’t looked at how they link and become part of the fabric of the city, not just from a physical perspective, but from a social and community perspective.
Ken Nettleship
Ken Nettleship of Invest in Nottingham accorded with Mayor Rees in the increased demand that Covid-19 has placed across services, hindering the capacity to deliver services. “A lot of the economic development work that we would normally be doing around business growth and support has taken a bit of a backstop really and is on hold.” However, it was reassuring to hear that Nottingham hasn’t come to a complete standstill, and there are a number of
Post Webinar Report “There’s a massive opportunity to be grasped here alongside the real challenges and difficulties that we’re seeing to reimagine cities for the future, to see them as greener, more inclusive economies that understand what makes a place work well and also how that then impacts the relationship us as human beings and the urban environment.
Chris Murray
major development projects in Nottingham which are continuing to make progress, “particularly around housing.” As well as this, businesses are still going ahead and expanding. “We’re still receiving inquiries of companies that are either coming into the UK, or expanding out of London.”
Murray stressed the importance in the short to medium term of national and local state intervention in maintaining competitiveness and economic base in the Core Cities. According to data that Murray presented, the UK has developed structural economic issues and the Core Cities (taken together, in the 70s and 80s more productive than London) have lost their ability to be economically resilient in the face of major crises such as that presented by Covid-19. “If we don’t address those underlying structural challenges in the economy, then the recession we’re facing will be far worse and far longer than it actually needs to be.” As it stands, Bristol is the only Core City that performs above the national average, but if all of the Core Cities could be brought up to the national average, that would generate an additional £70 billion pounds for the UK economy every year.
Key to bringing up the economies of the Core Cities and thus improving the lives of residents is getting the urban core right, and development in its broadest terms. This is where a developer such as First Base can step in. Speaking of the work that they are
As a developer, we don’t just believe that housing regenerates, we think we’ve got to deliver workspaces and social and cultural spaces because people want place. They need a home, but also somewhere to work and social spaces to knit the community together.
Olaide Oboh
doing in Bristol, Olaide Oboh said that their focus was on addressing the needs of local people in these unprecedented times and ensuring that the industry focuses on its most important asset – communities. She added that First Base’s focus on mixed-use developments with
Post Webinar Report spaces to live, work and socialise supports the growth of local town centres and significantly impacts on the local economy. When asked what First Base wants from government, Oboh was clear – investment in infrastructure (physical and digital) and a focus on public and private sector delivery. In Bristol, First Base are delivering homes – but in
tandem with this they are delivering workspace that will bring over 2,000 jobs to the city. Creating these blended spaces within which people can live, work, and spend their leisure time encourages them to stay in the area – important in the contexts of both economy and sustainability. Bristol seeks to work with developers in the mould of First Base – that is, developers who want to help solve problems of public health and resilience, and who build buildings that make cities “more resilient, tackle inequalities, and build social cohesion.” Rees also encouraged all developers to bear the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in mind when approaching the council. For First Base, the SDGs are critical. In the words of Oboh, these 17 SDGs “should drive development. They shouldn’t be seen (just) as something we’ve got to do, they should be seen as at the forefront of what we’re delivering”. This plays into Nottingham’s carbon-neutral strategy, and their own priorities around building social cohesion and community. During the development process, Nettleship voiced the importance of looking at what skills are brought in to the local area, as well as the provision of community food groups and other such initiatives. It is also important that new developments are cognizant of how they fit into the fabric of the city, and that they don’t become islands.
To deliver on schemes such as these local authorities need predictability from government – particularly in terms of finance. Mayor Rees claimed that government needed to better adapt to the dynamism of the world today. A more reliable partnership and more consistent funding would breed confidence in Bristol, and allow it to organize local supply chains. “We could plan, but we can’t plan when we find out we’re on the backfoot.” At present, too much energy is spent “reacting to government.” Murray built upon this sentiment, and set out his agenda for government to see the country through the coming months. He spoke to the immediate need
Post Webinar Report We can do some of that rescuing. The firepower of all those local authorities, the major cities, directed towards a joint approach to economic recovery
Mayor Marvin Rees
for preserving economic, employment and public service bases. Business, public service networks, and public transport can then recapitalise and adapt. He also called for a “bold” stimulus investment package for businesses, linked to a large-scale labour
market intervention around skills and employment programmes that are “locally driven.” All of this is underset by a need for greater decentralisation in the UK.
Covid-19 is most definitely a crisis, and the challenges that it poses to local authorities are manifold. However, the sense given by the panel was that Covid-19 is forcing the development industry to look at the way that it has worked in the past and the things that it has prioritised, and to reconsider them. As Oboh put it: “We have to focus on growth not just being about economic growth – it has to be about inclusive growth.” As well as this, developers must make sure that whatever growth is delivered is sustainable growth, and doesn’t have a negative impact on the environment. She added: “Whether that’s improving biodiversity, net-zero carbon, but also everything else – education, health and wellbeing, sustainable food, all the things that are important. We’ve got to make sure that is part of our growth story.”
Post Webinar Report POLLS AND INSIGHT A number of polls were carried out over the course of the webinar surveying the audience of industry professionals. Will Covid slow the trend towards urbanisation?
On a scale of 1 - 5, with 1 being the least important and 5 being the most important, how important is it that recovery programmes in the core cities are sustainable?
Unsure 29% Yes 40% No 31%
1 Unimportant
4%
2 Not very important
2%
3 Somewhat important 4 Important 5 Very important
Should more roadspace be allocated to cyclists in the core cities?
Unsure 11% No 5%
Yes 84%
8% 20% 66%
Should there be legislation for housing for key workers post-pandemic? 28 May, 11:00 – 12:00 The Homes for Heroes campaign is calling for national and local government and private investors to help fund 100,000 new homes for key workers in the UK postpandemic. Should the heroic efforts of key workers battling coronavirus be rewarded with a national programme of homebuilding that continues long-term? How will MMC techniques of building help to create high-quality, ecofriendly homes at speed? What can the public and private sector do together to take advantage of this unique opportunity? How would the mass creation of key worker housing in factories stimulate other areas of the economy? Speakers: Nick Towe Commercial director Edaroth Barbara Brownlee Executive director of growth, planning and housing, Westminster City Council Cllr Emily Davey Portfolio holder for housing, Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames
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