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Levelling up on the coast
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COASTAL COMMUNITIES
Levelling up on the coast
By Laura Edgar
The current Conservative government was elected on its pledge to address regional inequality and to level up the country. Yet much of the talk has been focused inland and on the North: improving east-to-west connections on the train; revitalising high streets and town centres; creating better job opportunities; and the retention of skilled workers. To these ends, areas across England have been supported through various government funds, such as the £3.6 billion Towns Fund and the Future High Streets Fund.
But what of coastal communities? According to ONS data from October 2020, towns on English and Welsh coasts are more likely to suffer from higher levels of deprivation than noncoastal towns. Two in every three (67 per cent) coastal towns are bracketed in the higher income deprivation category, whether as ‘working towns’ (high job density) or residential towns (low job density), compared with just over one in every three (36 per cent) non-coastal towns.
Eighty-five per cent of towns on the east coast of England – 39 out of 46 towns spanning the East of England, East Midlands, Yorkshire, the Humber and the North East – are in the higher income deprivation category. On England’s north-west coast the numbers are 16 out of 21.
A bid for Towns Fund money made by East Lindsey District Council (Lincolnshire) is instructive. The council’s area includes the coastal communities of Skegness and Mablethorpe. In planning its bid, the council found that these towns have high levels of deprivation, health inequalities and low wages (caused by the seasonal nature of the coastal economy, and now exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic).
To support the Skegness and Mablethorpe bid, Connected Coast was established, with the board seeking to diversify their economies, expand their skills base and establish them as national test beds for future living and natural resource management. The board comprises professionals from the public and private sectors.
Focus on youth
East Lindsey’s assistant director Lydia Rusling told The Planner that the council and its partners had chosen to focus on skills and education. Businesses canvassed during the bid spoke of problems in employing local people with the necessary skills.
“East Lindsey has disparate further education,” said Rusling. “Lincoln has universities, but there isn’t a college or similar for the coast. It is also difficult to travel between areas. The focus therefore wasn’t just on post-16 education, but lifelong learning”.
The Town Investment Plan – Skegness states that East Lindsey has the second-highest proportion of 16-to-18-year-olds in England living more than 30 minutes from a further education or sixth-form college (DfE).
The flagship project, a learning campus in partnership with further education provider TEC Group, seeks to address this, with a planned 56 per cent of Towns Fund money being allocated to this problem. The Mablethorpe Town Investment Plan features a campus for future living, Rusling explains, with the focus on improving health and wellbeing, attracting medical professionals and retaining them. In the 2021 Budget, chancellor Rishi Sunak allocated Connected Coast £48.4 million – £23.9 million for Mablethorpe and £24.5 million for Skegness.
The reasons why areas such as Mablethorpe and South Shields (far right) are being ‘left behind’ include low levels of social mobility, lack of available further education, low skills, or declining industries
Other allocations in the Budget to coastal communities include £37.5 million for Southport in Merseyside, with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government telling The Planner that a range of “exciting” projects across the town centre and seafront are to be funded, such as transforming Southport Theatre and infrastructure work to support Southport Pleasureland’s ambitions to become a major yearround tourist attraction.
A spokesperson for the ministry pointed to the government’s establishment of eight new freeports, including in the Solent, on the Humber and in Teesside, as part of its work to “support and regenerate communities across the country, including coastal areas”.
The levelling-up white paper due to be published later this year will, we are told, set out “bold new policy interventions to help improve livelihoods, spread opportunity and drive economic growth – all as part of our efforts to build back better from the pandemic”.
Since speaking to MHCLG, the ministry has announced further investment from the Towns Fund, including £25 million for Hartlepool and £25 million for Redcar.
Opportunities
In principle, the levelling-up agenda should benefit areas like North Tyneside, according to John Sparkes, head of regeneration and economic development at North Tyneside Council. Sparkes believes that the provision of long-term funding programmes from the government, including the Shared Prosperity Fund, “will help overcome some of the barriers that have hampered economic growth in the past”.
“This shared approach to investment in key infrastructure together with longterm investment in education, skills and training will enable us to compete effectively in international markets.”
Sparkes thinks the levelling-up agenda provides a golden opportunity for the council to work with government in addressing other barriers to inclusive economic growth, such as land/property and development values, “which, in areas such as the North East, are a world away from, say, the South East”.
“As things currently stand, it is not a level playing field and there are significant challenges around speculative commercial property development which often requires significant underwriting/de-risking by the public sector. Central to any success is the need for a joint long-term, strategic approach from central government in terms of both policy and funding.”
Town centres in Killingworth, North Shields, Whitley Bay and Wallsend all have very clear identities, Sparkes
“THE LEVELLING-UP WHITE PAPER DUE TO BE PUBLISHED LATER THIS YEAR WILL… SET OUT “BOLD NEW POLICY INTERVENTIONS TO HELP IMPROVE LIVELIHOODS, SPREAD OPPORTUNITY AND DRIVE ECONOMIC GROWTH’” –` MHCLG
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continued, and the council is working to secure their long-term sustainable future by “playing to their strengths and ensuring they complement each other in terms of their retail and leisure offer”.
In North Tyneside, many offshore type businesses are focused on renewables, with the generation of renewable energy “one of many opportunities for supporting our communities”, says Sparkes. Overall though, the long-term sustainability of the region’s coastal communities is dependent on many factors.
“A broad-based economy which aligns with our regional plans for recovery and which reflects our assets such as the River Tyne, our natural heritage and visitor offer, our grade A office accommodation together with our portfolio of industrial sites and buildings will be essential in achieving the inclusive economic growth for the borough.”
The wider opportunity
The Crown Estate, which manages the seabed and half the foreshore around England, says work to support development of the offshore renewables sector as part of the nation’s net-zero ambitions presents opportunities to breathe new life, jobs and growth into areas up and down the country.
For example, six proposed new offshore wind projects in the waters around England and Wales were announced by the Crown Estate in February, as part of its Offshore Wind Leasing Round 4.
Located off the coasts of Yorkshire, Lincolnshire, North Wales, Lancashire and Barrow-In-Furness, these sites could “support continued growth and investment in the UK offshore wind sector, which could employ as many as 60,000 people by 2030, up from approximately 11,000 today”.
All told, the UK Government has committed an initial £4 billion for the Levelling Up Fund for England over the next four years and another £800 million has been set aside for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The question is whether, as work on the levelling-up agenda progresses, the disparities between inland and coastal areas will be adequately addressed. Certainly, for Rusling, “one size won’t fit all in Lincolnshire”. What coastal communities need is different to what Nottingham or Swindon needs.
It is important, she explains, for East Lindsey District Council and Connected Coast, to use everything they have learned from the Towns Fund bid to address the needs of learning, skills and health and maximise investment into heritage. And it is encouraging, she adds, that the government is looking at heritage and not just creating shiny new buildings as part of its agenda.
The RTPI wants Local Environment Improvement Plans (LEIP) in England to be established, which would bring together all the various environmentrelated plans derived from the EU, now that the UK is no longer a member.
A coherent LEIP would develop a shared understanding of the environment, its problems and options.
Richard Blyth, head of policy and practice at the RTPI, explains that they “would include Shoreline Management Plans and ensure greater coordination of issues affecting districts with coasts in them”.
“LEIPs would also be easier to generate public engagement on and would also be easier to coordinate with local plans. They would be derived from the Local Nature Recovery Strategies envisaged in the environment bill but would go much further.”
Turn to page 28 to see how planners can help to make the shift from fossil fuels to renewables a fair one for communities
