Griff Rhys Jones made

THE PEOPLE'S

GRIFF RHYS JONES MAY HAVE MADE HIS NAME AS A COMEDIAN, ACTOR AND BROADCASTER, BUT THE PRESIDENT OF CIVIC VOICE HAS A LONGSTANDING PASSION FOR PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT WITH THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT, AS HE TELLS LAURA EDGAR

This year marks 10 years since the formal launch of Civic Voice, the national charity for the civic movement in England. Comedian, actor and television presenter Griff Rhys Jones has been its president from the beginning. In many ways he was a natural choice, given his high profi le among communities who care about their built environment as a result of the BBC TV series Restoration. Th is led to his being asked to act as fi gurehead for the charity’s predecessor Civic Trust, before that organisation ceased operations in 2009.

Civic Voice itself emerged from a wide consultation with civic and amenity societies, their members and more than 100 other organisations on the future of the civic movement. Conducted by Th e Civic Society Initiative, it coincided with David Cameron’s ‘big society’ drive to empower communities in shaping housing projects and transport services.

Ten years since its launch in Blackpool, Civic Voice is returning to the city in early May for a conference that will consider how to put public participation at the heart of placemaking.

Rhys Jones, as enthusiastic about his role today as he was when he accepted it, will be speaking, of course. Before this, though, he met Th e Planner at his Fitzrovia home on a fresh and sunny afternoon in early February. As I sat on the Tube from Th e Planner’s East London HQ, I refl ected on my time as a local journalist. I had heard many residents complain about not being listened to. At one consultation, a group of women told me they would not submit a response on a proposed development behind their houses because “the council doesn’t care and the developers don’t care what we think”. Given this attitude, and Civic Voice’s concern with giving communities a voice at every stage of the planning process, what would Rhys Jones say? I had my questions at the ready as I knocked on his front door.

RESTORATION MAN “I’ve experienced planning from every side,” he tells me. Th at’s as a developer, a conservationist, a campaigner, and from the “point of view of hoping, wishing”. At the outset of his built environment career, he thought of planning as the “enemy”, he confesses. But he soon found this was not the case and now “absolutely believes” in it.

His own property journey from considering “unlivable tiny sort of cupboards” in Hampstead to a grade I-listed Fitzrovia townhouse has been diverse. In the early days of his success on sketch show Not the Nine O’Clock News, he bought a home in Kilburn on an Equity minimum (“We found if we crossed the road into Kilburn, took Hampstead out of the name, suddenly you could buy a slightly bigger place”), which opened his eyes to the potential of run-down areas.

In the late 1980s, he turned a factory into fl ats in Clerkenwell. He went on to raise funds for and develop the threatened Hackney Empire. He bought and restored barns on a farm near St David’s in Pembrokeshire (Rhys Jones was born in Wales, but raised in Sussex and Essex). Th en there was Restoration, the BBC television series that ran from 2003 to 2009 and which invited viewers to choose listed buildings most in need of Heritage Lottery Funding to preserve and improve them. Th e show helped to shape his perspective both on the built environment and the history behind it. Today he is president of several organisations, including the Victorian Society, and says he likes to be “hands on”. Th rough all of this, planning has proved to be complicated.

“What I’ve discovered is that one size doesn’t fi t all,” Rhys Jones explains. “It’s very diffi cult to make universal statements about what is right and what is wrong. Each issue is decided on the fl oor and it is one of the reasons why planning becomes so fractious, complicated, so involving.”

I’m about to jump in with a question about how to address this, but the broadcaster launches into the story about his aforementioned education and the projects he has worked on. My carefully

curated questions lie untouched on the coff ee table. Bat surveys are frustrating, though necessary, he maintains. Planning departments are understaff ed. He’s well versed in the writings of Jane Jacobs, Peter Hall and Sir Simon Jenkins, it turns out. Th rough Restoration, he knows that people really do care about their community.

His enthusiasm and passion for conservation, buildings and community is limitless, it seems. He tells me, too, of his fascination with cities and in particular how urban areas develop in ways that can be welcoming, or not.

THE SENSE OF CITIES As he tours as a performer, he is conscious that there are many “wonderful towns, places like Shrewsbury and Hereford”, but that they are not all suitable places for people to live in anymore. “Th e truth is that when this government fi rst published its new planning guidelines (the NPPF), they sort of left that out,” he stresses. “Th ey said it’s all about business, it’s all about commerciality. If the centres of towns live solely by commerciality, they will also die by commerciality. And we’re seeing that happen now.”

GRIFF RHYS JONES CAREER HIGHLIGHTS

Born: Cardiff , November 1953 Education: Schools in Sussex and Essex; University of Cambridge (history and English)

19791982 Comes to fame via BBC TV series Not the Nine O’Clock News

1981 Founds Talkback Productions with Mel Smith

1987–1989 Converts a factory in Clerkenwell into fl ats. Th e scheme wins the Islington Society’s fi rst Geoff rey Gribble Memorial Conservation Award in 1990

20012004 Alongside the theatre’s artistic director, Roland Muldoon, he leads a restoration fundraising campaign for Hackney Empire

20032009 Host of BBC TV series Restoration 2005 Creates his own production company, Modern Television

2010present President, Civic Voice 2018present President, Th e Victorian Society 2019 Receives an OBE for services to charity and entertainment

Rhys Jones continues: “When people say ‘What’s going to happen to our high street?’, the answer is ‘Well, a lot of these high streets have over-extended’. In the ’70s they believed that retail and commerciality was king. And now they’re going, ‘Oh, wait a minute. All these places are going but you’ve bashed down perfectly good urban fabric’.”

On Oxford Street, people live “right amongst it” but the fl ats have become “fabulously expensive. Too expensive” and thus available to an exclusive group only. In Ipswich, by contrast, few people live in the centre and those that do are poorer.

He describes the area between the town’s docks, dotted with 16th and 18th century houses as “beautiful” but overlooked. “If those had been preserved as a living area, like the cathedral close, then somehow Ipswich and those towns would have to worry less about the high street dying because the high street would be sustained as part of an urban centre which isn’t all about commerce.” And no one needs to hop in a car, I chip in. Yes, Rhys Jones agrees. “But the attitude has always been ‘Can we build more car parks? Can we get more into the centre?’ And you’ve got to say ‘How do we keep this just nice. How do we keep it nice for people to be in?’”

Perking up the high street, therefore, isn’t about more and bigger shops. “Stop. Stop: Have a small high street and make it more amenable for people to actually live there.” Th is also means getting to grips with cars. While Rhys Jones favours using cars less, he doesn’t believe in banning them from town and city centres. Indeed, he was part of the campaign against the pedestrianisation of Oxford Street, where he says there wasn’t any due consideration for where the cars or buses would go. Th ey would have been pushed into side streets where people live. “Th at’s saying that shopping is more important in central London than anything else,” he complains.

By his own admission, he is a “big believer” in city living – but well-planned city living that strikes a balance between the built and natural environment, enabling good access to the latter. He advocates bigger, taller properties and gives Stockholm as an example. It’s still “very beautiful” but when you walk through the streets you are walking through seven-storey mansion blocks. “More mansions would allow less of a scramble for space across the suburban landscape,” he argues. “But it is very diffi cult to do. It means you have to own large blocks, doesn’t it?”

Suffi ce to say, he does not see green belt development as an answer to the challenges of fi nding space for homes in built-up areas.

OPEN ENGAGEMENT In advance of the December 2019 general election, Civic Voice called for all political parties to commit to ensuring that the planning system is accessible, balanced and collaborative. Conversations, it believes, should be had with everyone – not just those who are already engaged. Th e charity’s president thinks people care but perhaps don’t understand how things happen. You never see a debate about what is happening with development on Question Time, Rhys Jones points out. “Never, never, never. Planning and architecture are two slightly closed books to society in general.”

He adds: “I think it is a good idea to open it up to ignoramuses like me. No seriously, because I think it is important to hear voices and what people think about things.”

Tech is one tool for giving people a voice and amplifying it. But he also advises civic societies and community groups to be completely familiar with planning regulations, to bring experts onside and to keep their battles within the law, preferably using the law to their advantage. “I'm a believer in the existing laws being well applied,” he observes.

He cautions against civic societies becoming coteries of self-identifi ed experts and insists that his priority with Civic Voice is to make “this business” – consultation and meaningful engagement – interesting, heartfelt and understandable. Th e community must ask questions about what is going on, says Rhys Jones. “Is this the right way of doing things? Th at seems to me, an important level for Civic Voice to be involved in.”

Above all, Rhys Jones asserts that civic societies, local authorities, developers, politicians et al should remember that engagement is all about “not being frightened about letting people into the debate”.

n Laura Edgar is news editor of Th e Planner

CIVIC VOICE 10TH ANNIVERSARY CONFERENCE

1 -2 May 2020, Winter Garden, Blackpool Th e conference will consider how to put public participation at the heart of placemaking and decisionmaking. Sue Manns FRTPI, president of the RTPI, will be exploring how to give community representatives a more meaningful voice in the planning system.

Professor Gavin Parker FRTPI will consider how planning can introduce ‘Pre-Application

Community Consultation’, while professor Matthew Carmona will consider how design review can be more transparent and accessible to communities.

Civic Voice’s 2020 Woman of Infl uence, Sarah James MRTPI, will share her thoughts on the benefi ts of introducing a limited community right of appeal into the system while Griff Rhys Jones will be the afterdinner speaker on day one.

www.civicvoiceconference.com