Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic regeneration indicators have been grouped into 8 themes loosely covering areas of local economic development activity:
A series of indicators for economic regeneration of an area were laid out by the Audit Commission to facilitate the eďŹƒcient and eective spending of public money. Kevin Ambrose was the key author of the Ecoregen document which has served as guidance for the work the Ragged project is undertaking.
Employment Unemployment and business statistics of the area; how many working, how many on benefits, how many businesses, what kind of businesses, how many jobs
Earnings and skills Who has what skills, what education, who works in what jobs
Economic vitality Investment and development parks, indicators, travel and parking
Demography and deprivation Crime levels, poverty levels, health statistics
Town centres and tourism Shops, venues, community spaces, libraries, museums, public art, attractions, parks, shared spaces, third places, cinema, leisure centres
Workforce development and employability Education opportunities, open university, colleges, schools, night schools, training schemes, job agencies, entrepreneurial schemes, incubators
Investment Business Areas of development, scalable businesses, business districts, large employers
Social enterprise support Clubs, social groups, meetups, associations, societies, charities, CIC’s, funding, management training, software training
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Each of these themes will factor into the plan to stimulate economic regeneration of Streatham Common. A discussion of general issues will precede a detailed plan of approach where Ragged will work within the Streatham Bridge Business Association will act to implement the actions detailed with what resources are available. The factors involved in neighbourhood renewal and economic regeneration are dynamic and many change according to the time period and situation.
We will be drawing on the thinking of the Audit Commission, economists, and professionals experienced in the area of urban regeneration. Inviting the expertise and support of the Royal Society of Arts as an enlightenment organisation, the Chamber of Commerce, CRESC, the Federation of Small Businesses, and entrepreneurs with civic stakeholdership, Ragged hopes to coordinate an eective multi-perspective long term project to improve the lives of the communities of Streatham and their surrounding partners.
This overview has been written to introduce some of the issues looked at in the analysis of the economic well-being of an area and what notions must be considered for an eective improvement plan. Organisations and stakeholders can improve performance by identifying and sharing good practice and alongside learning from others. This practice of passing on experience will be central to the strategy which the Ragged project employs. Mutuality, co-construction, and the building of inclusive social capital are the core elements of the ethos being employed here.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
The Strength of a Collective It is clear that we would all like to be a part of a safe, prosperous, healthy community; this amounts to quality of life and happiness. An egalitarian community is an important part of realising this vision where everyone has the right to the same opportunities, freedoms and respects, and where shared prosperity ultimately stems from this.
A community which evokes a sense of pride sufficient to make each individual feel invested in the extended network as a whole, and other individuals, is the basis of civic pride and a collaborative society. Thus, in this idea of community, people work hard to create a thriving, sustainable and engaging environment which improves everyone’s experience.
Being in a valued landscape adds value to your own stock. A central economic axiom which is borne in mind here is that of David Hume’s - ‘it is good to have a prosperous neighbour’.
‘it is good to have a prosperous neighbour’
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
A Landscape of Improvement A critically informed position is being drawn together, in part from the key findings of the Economic Scrutiny Committee Short Scrutiny Study. Improving community environments involves: Making housing available, building better quality homes, and working to reduce the causes of homelessness and hence homelessness itself.
Making available and improving the local public services which facilitate economy and higher standards of living. Developing areas financially to make paid work accessible through entrepreneurship, skill based education and capital enterprise.
Working to produce sustainable elements of community environment in terms of self supporting logistically thought out schemes. Finding and implementing enlightened policy which addresses anti-social behaviour and socially negative extreme behaviour.
Finding and implementing enlightened policy
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Neighbourhood Renewal An inclusive culture is one of the strengths of the United Kingdom. Drawing upon this legacy, there is a responsibility to emphasize and strengthen principles of race and class equality to facilitate community cohesion. Neighbourhood decline refers to the process by which areas become disadvantaged and includes
environmental, social and economic factors. Neighbourhood renewal aims to reverse this process, improve the quality of life and attract people back into declining areas.
Pleasant and vibrant surroundings set the scene for the psychology of the community and a backdrop of optimism important to foster the collaborative networks necessary for economic prosperity.
Neighbourhood renewal looks at the physical environment as well as the cultural landscape which both factor into health and well being.
An inclusive culture is one of the strengths of the UK
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Regeneration Economic regeneration is one aspect of neighbourhood renewal; Economic regeneration aims to strengthen the local economy and create wealth by tackling worklessness – a term used to include people who are unemployed, economically inactive or actively out of work – and promoting job creation. Economic regeneration aims also to change behaviour, encouraging and supporting local people to become more entrepreneurial. It is important to be clear and consistent about the definitions used for economic regeneration, worklessness and overall neighbourhood renewal as these mould the priorities and parameters for operational practice, not just the initial project implementation. Economic regeneration includes actions designed to prepare and assist potential employees for work (supply) and actions designed to increase the demand for employees (demand). It can occur as a
series of ad hoc initiatives, projects or actions. Such measures as simplifying and removing barriers to working are as important in this area as providing the ability for people to upskill and thus engage job markets. Economic regeneration works most effectively within a strategic framework, which is best effected when aligned with local stakeholders, established institutions, communities of practice and individual voices. To be effective and to create sustainable and inclusive communities, economic regeneration needs to complement social and environmental regeneration initiatives. The Ragged model therefore will be divided into three main areas which are united under the title of neighbourhood renewal. It is difficult to separate out economic regeneration from the social and environmental, particularly the indirect
aspects of neighbourhood renewal that assist economic regeneration. Initiatives ultimately fail if there is a lack of linkage between environmental development and economic activities. All initiatives must be implemented in such a way as to benefit the socially excluded. To be truly effective they require to be deliberately targeted at the most challenged, deprived and excluded communities. Economic development, growth and investment can fail to assist local economically inactive residents and thus is not the same as Economic Regeneration. Employment and worklessness strategies can assist in ensuring that there is greater participation by local residents in the local economy. The need to include all the communities of an area in activities is critical to creating a long term impact.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Chief Objectives To clearly define and overtly state what economic regeneration means in order to ensure that proper transparency surrounds strategies and to help raise the profile and importance of neighbourhood renewal across the collaborating communities.
Clarity is required regarding the interface between economic, social and environmental regeneration. Key strategic locations need to be identified in order to chose the appropriate places for implementation of initiatives.
To understand and align structurally with the government and council’s vision, aims, objectives, and definitions for economic regeneration in a way which is complementary way in order to provide a clear and consistent framework that aims for structual alignment where possible.
Transparency of process and involvement in co-constructing the environment is pivotal to ownership and therefore tangible stakeholdership. A co-operative atmosphere must be established to provide a foundation to the growing of a cultural eco-system which suits its inhabitants rather than imposing a top-down installation.
This will assist with prioritising resources, directing practice, and facilitate partnership working. This ensures that duplication does not isolate and deplete available resources and that credit is given to all stakeholders invested in the common aim of neighbourhood renewal.
The development of a Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Time-sensitive (SMART) action plan and Policy Statement for mainstreaming and embedding economic regeneration within the area is needed for the ability to eectively project manage the scheme.
An encompassing social contract informed by the collective discourses needs to be established with outcome based targets and performance indicators in key places. It is important to ensure that the local economic development strategy and neighbourhood improvement plan are cohesive with the shared objectives set out by the project. An undertaking like neighbourhood renewal can only be done on a long term basis and not as a part of a boom and bust funding model. Hence a need for continued of lobbying of government, application to funding bodies, grants, and trust funds to address finance issues. To create a lasting legacy it is important to ensure adequate resources are available to develop and coordinate a longitudinal and regional approach.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Action Plans Action plans need to be developed to ensure that, across the collaborative body, all available resources are maximised and made available throughout the community in an equitable manner. The use of resources for convergent initiatives by all local groups is something which must be carefully managed.
It is necessary to support all bids to provide additional local training, communities of interest and enterprise centres. Similarly, good working relationships with regional partners and agencies ensures that the area fully benefits from any regional regeneration, skills training and investment programmes.
Spending must be balanced across the three areas of social, environmental, and economic landscapes. This must be done with transparency and allow for correct sequencing and weighting of priorities by project managers.
Provision must be made to work with local stakeholders and expertise to deliver a worklessness strategy that contains both supply and demand activities, and provide a framework to incorporate existing and new activities.
Measures need to ensure there are sufficient, specific industry targeted training services including customer services, hospitality, tourism, construction and Information and Communications Technology (ICT) skills. A key aim in continuity of experience is to ensure that employment opportunities are available following training, for example in areas such as plumbing, electrical, carpentry and ICT. Utilisation of cooperative and inclusive ‘guild practices’ as well as online freelance job markets are options which should be adapted and explored.
‘Provision must be made to work with local stakeholders’
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Action Plans - cont. There is a need to remove barriers to work including the need for provision of childcare services which are accessible to all. Through dialogue an approach should be developed to tackle second generation unemployment. The attitudes and behaviours associated with the perpetuation of poverty and disenfranchisement need to be a focus so that the hard to reach groups are engaged with support mechanism incentives and reduced bureaucracies. Language exchange and learning, along with basic literacy initiatives are parallel requirements.
Bridging and linking forms of social capital are important factors to break down the acculturation which isolates individuals from the knowledge spillover which social capital provides. Research suggests this is important for thriving communities and social mobility. Provision must be made to ensure that local recruitment policy and procedures include consideration of the possibility of expanding the use of the Council’s, and natural monopoly firms’ recruitment channels to address economic inactivity by providing training, incentive and opportunity.
The ideal is to ensure that sustainable procurement policy encourages economic regeneration via use of local labour plus use of materials sourced and constructed in the region. This type of action plan would tap into the benefits which come of a structural alignment of simple demand and supply interrelationships.
‘Bridging and linking forms of social capital are important’
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Priorities and Strategies Possible priorities for economic regeneration are: growing employment for all; improving entrepreneurial rates; helping the hardest to reach into work and building a stronger local economy. These can be achieved by various means, including specific programmes that include skills and training schemes, business start up and support projects, as well as wider programmes encompassing growth areas such as tourism, culture, ICT and creativity projects.
As stated, the aim of economic regeneration must complement social and environmental regeneration schemes, creating inclusive communities and tackling social exclusion. Strategies must therefore be multi-leveled and develop a capacity to deal with complex (wicked) problems. Economic Regeneration may occur as a series of ad hoc initiatives, projects and actions, as part of a wider scheme encompassing all aspects of regeneration or as part of a planned programme for economic regeneration.
There may be a specific strategy for economic regeneration, an overarching strategy that incorporates economic regeneration or a series of separate strategies that touch on economic regeneration. Analysis of social netowrks, traďŹƒc plans and available infrastructure are important considerations for understanding the existing landscape which must be built upon. A priority is to map and unite the existing community in a joint activity.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Development and Employment Research by Professor Michael Campbell (Leeds Metropolitan University) has highlighted that general economic development, growth strategies and inward investment do not necessarily ensure that jobs created go to local people who are unemployed. Instead, economic development can result in structural changes that initially exclude more local people from jobs than they include. Growth strategies and inward investment can result in widely differing numbers of jobs and all of these can result in commuters or people who can afford to migrate into the area benefiting from the new jobs. Professor Campbell therefore stresses the importance of an ‘employment strategy’ which helps to ensure that the jobs created go to local people who are unemployed. These vary according to the characteristics of local labour markets
depending on whether they need more supply actions (helping to prepare and assist potential employees for work) or demand actions (actions aimed at increasing the demand for employees) or a mix of these. An initial review of employment strategies concluded that to be as successful as possible, they needed to tackle both supply and demand. The evaluation also highlighted that many of the jobs created by the first raft of employment strategies either did not go to local residents or got ‘creamed off ’ by those best placed to achieve employment, leaving those ‘furthest away’ from the labour market as disadvantaged as before. A review of actions to help tackle worklessness shows as follows:
Supply Side: 1.
2.
3. 4. 5. 6.
7.
Increasing access to employment by improving transport links and providing accessible childcare Increasing skills base by providing education and training Helping the ‘hardest to reach’ into work Improve support services to lone parents Increase support to ‘second generation’ workless Deliver support services differently e.g. via libraries, employment support centres, mobile job support centres Providing intensive outreach and support to help overcome a culture of worklessness
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Development and Employment - cont. Demand Side: 8.
9.
10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.
Challenging employers behaviour e.g. why aren’t they interviewing unemployed applicants Encouraging a suitable infrastructure to support new job creation e.g. transport, housing choice and access to good quality services Providing accommodation for new business Attracting and creating new jobs Encourage business start-ups Providing business advice and support Forming a partnership with local employers Providing access to broadband
The basic approach to unemployment reduction measures is essentially short term and microeconomic, embracing non-economic factors where relevant. The criteria used in appraising unemployment reduction measures need to be standardised in order to provide comparable evaluations. Structural unemployment is the mismatch of a whole series of qualities such as education, training, organisation size, locations, personnel, skills, experience, and working hours, where employees and potential employers are not in line. These are the main problems to be addressed by reduction measures.
Possible strategies of addressing worklessness are as follow:
Reducing the numbers of people needing paid work: Retiring earlier - Stopping work after retirement - Substituting directly retired by unemployed - Partially retiring Expanding education - Providing more training Sharing the work: Shortening the working week - Shortening the working year - Reducing overtime Fostering part time employment Reorganising working patterns Matching people with jobs: Bringing jobs to depressed areas - Helping people in depressed areas to take jobs elsewhere - Improving the job finding process - Building the confidence and skills of the unemployed
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Development and Employment - cont. Using marginal subsidies: Reducing wage cost by recruitment subsidy - Awarding grants for increases in employment
Three strategic themes for encouraging economic activity at a local level are: 1.
Organising business for employment: Averting closure and redundancy -promoting and assisting new businesses Providing work in the community and public sector: Finding work for the long term unemployed - Employing people directly in jobs in the public sector
To secure labour market participation by engaging varied communities; matching skills to employment and ensuring that current and future skills requirements of companies in growth sectors are aligned.
2.
To encourage businesses to invest in workforce development at all levels.
3.
To develop opportunities for local people by bringing forward practical projects to secure employment such as construction and retail initiatives.
The scope of this document is to provide an overview of microeconomic measures each capable of contributing to unemployment reduction. This is to facilitate looking at an environment and thinking through what might be achieved as far as a strategy to deal with worklessness. When measuring for opportunity of work, the notion of ‘deadweight loss’ and ‘opportunity costs’ must be brought into consideration, particularly where work forces are at the mercy of natural monopolies which can come about through universally required infrastructure and services such as transport or energy provision.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Development and Employment - cont. Deadweight cost or loss is commonly expressed in terms which relate the extent to which the value and impact of a tax, tax relief or subsidy is reduced because of its side eects. For instance, increasing the amount of tax levied on workers’ pay will lead some workers to stop working or work less, so reducing the amount of extra tax to be collected.
However, creating a tax relief or subsidy to encourage people to buy life insurance would have a deadweight cost because people who would have bought insurance anyway would benefit.
If the cost of working outweighs the benefits to a certain demographic then a dialogue must be established to investigate and deal with this before the worklessness problem can be realistically resolved.
Opportunity cost refers to the cost of any activity measured in terms of the value of the next best alternative which is not chosen. It is the sacrifice related to the alternative choices available to an individual, or group, who has picked among several mutually exclusive choices.
An analysis of barriers to work must include a conversation which involves that of deadweight loss and opportunity costs.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Resilience and Environment Local economic resilience is something which should be the ‘nurtured’ as the ability of an economy to recover from or adjust to the effects of adverse shocks to which it may be exposed. The more you have diversified local commerce, the less exposed you are to the broader vagaries of markets and depletion of resources. An environmentally stable local economy is also a resilient economy. This is the thinking behind transition towns. The Transition concept emerged from the work of permaculture designer Rob Hopkins. The aim of the Transition
project is to equip communities for the dual challenges of climate change and peak oil. The Transition Towns initiative is an example of socioeconomic localisation which builds in resilience through diversity, a commercial eco-culture, comparative advantage, and the opportunity to capitalise on networks of association.
initiatives will be used to improve the area. The extended benefits confer positive effects on health, happiness, civic oriented behaviour and urban infrastructure such as drainage.
Environment plays a complex role in behaviour and wellbeing, which factor into other areas of life such as economy. With the help of horticulturalists and urban greening experts, planting-growing
‘An environmentally stable economy is a resilient economy’
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Social Capital in The Landscape A growing body of evidence indicates that the size and density of social networks and institutions, and the nature of interpersonal interactions, significantly affect the efficiency and sustainability of development programs. Robert Putnam wrote in “Bowling Alone” of the decline taken place recently in the participation of people in voluntary organisations. Social capital broadly refers to social relationships; people being involved in organisations where the membership of those organisations serves as a resource for the individuals within those organisations. If you are a member of some organisation of this kind, you can then use it to tap into the knowledge of others; these organisations hold within
them informal networks which are useful for contacts, they also serve as places to form friendships and support, and so on. The heart of the issue surrounding social capital is that there has been a decline in participation of such organisations and this raises much discussed issues about individuals and their status in society. This issue provides a focus for wider discussions all of which incorporate the notion of the individual and the importance of networks. Alexis de Tocqueville, a French commentator on America in the 19th century wrote in his “Democracy in America” about these things and argued membership in such organisations served to moderate what he thought was
otherwise destructive individual self interest. Alexis DeTocqueville found the American pioneer of 1830 anything but culturally impoverished “… he is, in short, a highly civilized being who consents for a time to inhabit the backwoods… It is difficult to imagine the incredible rapidity with which thought circulates in the midst of these deserts. I do not think that so much intellectual activity exists in the most enlightened districts of France…” In the 1950s voluntary organisations became a focus of argument when people started talking about totalitarianism and individual agency. The character of a totalitarian society in that context was often claimed as resulting of an absence of institutions
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Economic Resilience and Environment standing in between the individual and the government. Voluntary organisations are independent of the state. With the loosening and then collapse of Soviet influence in Eastern Europe, a number of intellectuals there became interested in understanding their own societies, and in a sense, tried to diagnose what it was that was missing when a comparison was made between their societies and those in Western Europe and the United States. What they stressed as significant was voluntary organisations, and they placed stress in this context on the notion of civil society. These voluntary organisations acted as mediating interests between the individual and government.
Robert Putnam, the Harvard political scientist, has invigorated the topic through collaboration with colleagues in Italy. In a study he argued that a new level of local government in Italy worked best where there was a strong heritage of voluntary organisation or association. Amongst other claims, Putnam suggests that greater social capital feeds into aggregate economic growth, greater health, and greater happiness. From this discussion it can be seen that the concept of social capital is not new, although the term is. The origins of the concept can be traced past thinkers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and is rooted in economics, sociology, anthropology and political science literature.
Since its original use, the term has received unprecedented acceptance and application to diverse areas. Economists suggest that the origin of social capital theory is in the formative period of economic sociology with Max Weber. Others draw links between social capital theory and questions posed by Adam Smith in The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Knack identified Adam Smiths discussion of the potential negative spillovers of group activities as an aspect of social capital debate. Smith stated that when 'people of the same trade' meet 'even for merriment and diversion' the result is often 'a conspiracy against the public' or 'some contrivance to raise prices'.
Streatham Bridge Economic Regeneration
Social Capital in The Landscape Here the idea of negative externalities and spillovers are dealt with. These ideas are further reinforced by the work of Sheilagh Ogilvie and Roberta Dessi in Social Capital and Collusion: The Case of Merchant Guilds. The other side of this discussion which can be harnessed is that of positive spillovers and externalities, such as are found in the example of the inclusive charter of Manchester and its guilds. The Charter of Manchester allowed anyone to gain access to work and so this resulted in a great deal of knowledge spillover and economic activity. This is what is meant by an ‘inclusive guild practice’. Without a culture of open participation a closed reactionary
economy results which undermines and harms itself through a gridlock arising from mercantilist protectionism, a homogeneity of produce and a lack of activity of diverse stakeholders. These economic views also translate into knowledge terms where opportunity brings about an aggregation of minds, and knowledge spillover results in invention as well as innovation. The absence of opportunity closes off these effects. The sharing of knowledge is a stimulus to exponential societal advance. Gerald A. Carlino describes the positive effects of ‘knowledge spillover’ as a ‘non-rival knowledge market externality’ that has a spillover effect of stimulating
technological improvements in a neighbour through one's own innovation. Knowledge spillover is a major mechanism of social capital and an open culture which is the vital ‘substrate of trust’ from which proactive communities form. Inclusive social capital is the cultural humus which must be cultivated for renewal projects to work and thrive. This initiative will take special interest in propagating civic networks and self sustaining community resources so that a legacy is created to carry forward neighbourhood renewal and economic regeneration in Streatham.