Morgan, Phil

Nathan, Max

English

UCL Discovery

128 NEW ECONOMYNew Labour has always promised afresh approach to politics: so weshould also expect a fresh set of poli-cies. Have these come about? Sometimes‘new’ policies are often refined versions of oldideas from previous administrations, but inurban and regional policy a mixture of oldideas and new distinctive thinking hasemerged. The new agenda has several welcome ele-ments, particularly its stress on ‘joined-up’policy making. There are limits to joiningup, however, and some real problems withcurrent policy coherence and delivery. Inmany ways, urban and regional policy is notjoined up – and this has to change. Three key themes in current policy can bedistinguished:● Devolution – Scotland and Wales now havetheir own parliaments; Regional Develop-ment Agencies (RDAs) have been estab-lished in the English regions (with parallelRegional Chambers emerging in most)● Social inclusion – the Social Exclusion Unithas been set up to co-ordinate governmentactivity; an array of initiatives is in place,most notably the New Deals, the New Dealfor Communities (NDC) and the latestround of the Single Regeneration Budget(SRB)● Urban renaissance – many of the UK’s poor-est neighbourhoods are in urban areas. TheUrban Task Force report argued for policiesto reverse the decline of cities.As this suggests, the elements of urban andregional policy are linked and should be seenas part of a wider national ‘regeneration’strategy.This (mostly) new urban and regionalagenda reinforces the area-based policy trend– focused on particular estates in some cases.It also recognises the predominantly struc-tural economic base of exclusion and as such,continues the slow convergence of urban andregional policy which began in the 1977 UrbanWhite Paper. Several cross-cutting themes are also clear.One of the most important is a focus on com-munities and community-based regenera-tion. Community involvement and ownershipare not always taken seriously, as the SocialExclusion Unit’s report argues:It is now well recognised that, for local regen-eration to be effective, communities need to beinvolved. But, too often, community involve-ment is paid no more than lip service.Community-based regeneration links withanother important policy theme – joining up.The Government recognises that the roots ofurban and regional malaise are complex andAll togethernow?Testing for joined-up urban and regional policy MAX NATHAN & PHIL MORGANCentre for Local EconomicStrategies1070-3535/99/020128 + 04 © 1999 IPPRNEWE 6.3  2/8/99 12:54 pm  Page 128ALL TOGETHER NOW? 129need solutions that cut across traditionaldivides. As the Prime Minister has pointedout, ‘joined-up problems demand joined-upsolutions’. Linking the social and the economic in thisway can bear fruit: at macro and micro lev-els, a skilled, healthy and motivated work-force can help provide a competitive edge andwell-serviced, cohesive cities can help attractinvestment.The strongest indicator of New Labour’sdesire to exemplify joined-up government, inthought and deed, is the establishment of theSocial Exclusion Unit. The unit looks at com-plex problems, operating across departmentsand is centrally co-ordinatedby the Cabinet Office. How-ever, there is a significant gulfbetween thinking and doing,policy and practice. Joined-up thinking is hard enough;joined-up policy is harder. Thinking and doingThe Social Exclusion Unit hasestablished 18 separate PolicyAction Teams. Research commissioned bythe DETR – apparently unconnected to thework of the Social Exclusion Unit – hasalready uncovered extensive governmentalfailure to join up. Pervasive departmentalismhas degraded learning and the capacity towork across departments at all levels. Local-ly, this means less capacity to deliver new pro-grammes; centrally it means unconnectedpolicy-making, less control over activity anda poor understanding of actual conditions.Local agents are faced with a confusion ofoverlapping programmes: time is wastedworking them out, rather than putting themto use. The current rash of ‘initiativitis’ –new Zones, Deals, Pilots and Task Forces – isalready causing alarm. A further threat is‘initiative fatigue’, where some practitionerseffectively give up trying to understand pol-icy and resort to ‘satisficing’. Things are slowly changing. The PolicyAction Team on ‘Learning lessons’ highlightssome key factors for success on the ground:acquiring key skills and knowledge, devel-oping a knowledge management system andevidence-based strategies, and encouragingentrepreneurship.PartnershipTo make complex policies work, the agenciesinvolved must develop effective partnerships,which are often difficult to achieve. There issignificant local experience of partnership –agencies on the ground have been grapplingwith the notion for some time. The experienceof CLES is that partnershipssucceed when they:● include – with an empha-sis on extending participa-tion and achieving change● develop a common lan-guage with open communi-cations and clear aims,objectives and actions● strive to achieve early suc-cess and properly balanceaccountability and effectiveness● allow relationships of trust and under-standing to develop between partners.The Government’s regeneration agenda isambitious. However, it will not succeedwithout non-contradictory policies deliv-ered in this coherent and accessible way. Asthe Government is fond of reminding us, partof the reality of joined-up policy is makinghard choices. Where two policy objectivesconflict, which should prevail and whoshould decide? A third way is not always athand.A classic recent example is the Govern-ment’s desire to revitalise cities by, in effect,preventing out-of-town development, whilstinjecting price competition into the super-market sector by scrapping planning con-trols. The DETR and DTI are at loggerheadsalong with at least four interests (sustainable“Where two policyobjectives conflict,which should prevailand who shoulddecide? A third wayis not always athand”NEWE 6.3  2/8/99 12:54 pm  Page 129 14680041, 1999, 3, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-0041.00085 by <Shibboleth>-member@ucl.ac.uk, Wiley Online Library on [14/08/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License130 NEW ECONOMYdevelopment and consumer welfare versuscompetitive markets and consumer wel-fare). There is no clear right and wrong –only incompatibility. Joining up has its limits.Testing for connected policy-makingSo, how is the Government doing so far? Toget some idea, we subject the three key ideasthat make up the new urban and regional pol-icy to the test.DevolutionA clear responsibility for policy-making bod-ies at the regional level are the widespreaddiscrepancies in social and economic condi-tions that exist across UK regions. In England,the Government has created RDAs with themain remit of driving up GDP per head (seeIPPR Indicators, p146). RDAs are also chargedwith ensuring social inclusion and sustainabledevelopment. At the same time, voluntaryRegional Chambers – with mostly localauthority membership – have been set up inmany regions.At the time of writing, RDAs were on thepoint of producing their Regional Econom-ic Strategies (RESs). An enormous amount ofenergy has been spent discussing the newregional agenda, with little concrete result.CLES will shortly be producing its own eval-uation of the RES, though concerns havealready emerged. A recent House of Com-mons Select Committee report sets these outhighlighting the following three:● RDAs need to do some long-term thinkingabout regional economic development, butthere is evidence that they lack the neces-sary power and resources● there is a danger that RDAs will concentratepurely on economic development – theirstated primary goal – contradicting joined-up thinking on regeneration. The Govern-ment may need to boost the profile of RDAs’social exclusion and sustainable develop-ment remits● there is as yet no mechanism for reconcilingRegional Economic Strategies with theRegional Planning Guidance framework(RPG). The two might easily conflict, with,say, the RES encouraging development ona greenfield site and the RPG forbidding it.The Government’s stance is that the twoforces can reconcile themselves informally.Until this happens – and it is unclear howit might – we are left with the possibility ofparalysis in regional decision-making. Regional governance is also fragile. TheRegional Chambers, which drive RegionalPlanning Guidance formulation, are theunhappy children of two incompatibleneeds: preserving RDAs’ direct ministerialaccountability, and the need for regionaland sub-regional devolution. Grasping thistension is crucial to understanding thepotential for conflict in regional relation-ships.In theory, RDAs need have no real contactwith Regional Chambers: though there wouldthen be no local accountability. In practice,large efforts have been made by both sideswith RDAs behaving as if Regional Chambershave a democratic mandate; there has beenliaison, joint working, consultation, person-al contact and so on. The potential for conflict is still there,however. Local authority leaders sitting onRegional Chambers dislike the fact thatRDAs are not accountable to them andRDAs dislike being told they are unac-countable. Government offices – helping tosteer RPG and working with RDAs in anumber of areas – complicate the picture stillfurther.So far, both sides have dealt with the prob-lem by not talking about it and in a way, thiskind of behaviour is important if there is tobe any kind of inclusive regional leadership.However, it is easy to see how things couldgo badly wrong. Genuine institutional equal-ity will only come with moves towards fully-fledged regional government.NEWE 6.3  2/8/99 12:54 pm  Page 130 14680041, 1999, 3, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-0041.00085 by <Shibboleth>-member@ucl.ac.uk, Wiley Online Library on [14/08/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons LicenseALL TOGETHER NOW? 131Social inclusionThe Government is committed to social inclu-sion and sees work as the vital mechanism tore-attach people to society. Employmentmeans inclusion: benefit systems thought tofoster long-term unemployment, welfaredependence and exclusion have to bereshaped to deliver unemployed people intowork. It is too early to say how the Govern-ment’s welfare to work strategy is working.However, there is some real concern abouthow ‘employability’ is conceived and howwell policy is actually joining up. Recentresearch by CLES found that, at the locallevel, unemployed people,employers and agenciesengaged in delivery werefaced with an ever-expand-ing range of programmes.This is confusing for all andcan be counterproductive,costly and ineffective.A more coherent mecha-nism for welfare to work pol-icy delivery at all levels isrequired. This is true ofregeneration policy morebroadly where different programmes are cur-rently operated by different levels of gov-ernment in different locations. An area mayreceive the New Deal for Communities runby the Government Regional Office; SRB runby the RDA and Sure Start run by DfEE inWhitehall.At the launch of the Social Exclusion Unitin September 1998, the Prime Minister stressedthe need to consider communities in socialexclusion policy: ‘Our goal is simple: it is tobridge the gap between the poorest neigh-bourhoods and the rest of Britain.’ The NDCdevelops this idea into policy. The programme,currently underway in 17 Pathfinder author-ities, is flexible and very local. Particular neigh-bourhoods in selected local authority areascompete for NDC funding. Neighbourhoodprogrammes can deliver any goals, and anybody can lead strategies – including housingassociations and the voluntary sector (althoughfew of these bids have been approved). Thefifth round of the SRB has also been redesignedto emphasise community and local involve-ment in regeneration.The local emphasis of the new policies iswelcome. However, an extreme area-basedfocus is of concern. Does it assist inclusion,or deflect attention from other excluded areas?NDC Pathfinders were selected using theIndex of Local Deprivation, arguably the bestmeasure available, but which the DETR recog-nises needs revision. Until better data is gen-erated, particularly at the mostlocal levels, social inclusionpolicy risks missing deprivedareas. Even allowing for pro-gramme expansion and theimpact of SRB5, need is clear-ly more widespread than theareas selected for NDC. With-in Pathfinder areas, deprivedneighbourhoods competeagainst each other, and theworst-off communities, withlow morale and organisation-al capacity, may never succeed. What is most worrying is that the new pol-icy agenda sees only half the problem. The1977 Urban White Paper pointed out that ‘Insome cities such as Glasgow and Liverpool,there is a general lack of demand for labourwhich affects the whole but is particularlysevere in the inner areas.’Over two decades later, what has changed?The 20 major cities in Britain have lost over500,000 jobs since 1981, while the rest of thecountry has gained 1.7 million jobs (Turok andEdge, 1999). Nationally, unemployment hasfallen, but in many urban and old industrialareas employment growth is slower than thedecline in unemployment. Unemployed peo-ple are leaving the register and falling out ofthe system.“there is a dangerthat RDAs willconcentrate purely oneconomicdevelopment – theirstated primary goal –contradicting joined-up thinking onregeneration”NEWE 6.3  2/8/99 12:54 pm  Page 131 14680041, 1999, 3, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-0041.00085 by <Shibboleth>-member@ucl.ac.uk, Wiley Online Library on [14/08/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License132 NEW ECONOMYGovernment urban and regional policyhas to face up to the problem of the ‘jobs gap’:there are more unemployed people thanvacancies in many areas. Of course, employ-ment generation is only part of the solutionto local unemployment. However, as Turokand Edge point out, current regenerationstrategies focus on skills, motivation and pro-gramme design to the detriment of thedemand side of the labour market. It seemsunlikely that the Jobs Policy Action Teamwill bite this bullet either: but without doingso, policy will not get to grips with the struc-tural causes of decline.Urban renaissanceThe origins of the Urban Task Force lie in thedebate on where new house building shouldtake place. 3.8 million new households areexpected by 2016. Should new homes to holdthem be constructed on greenfield – andoften green belt – sites, or on urban, pre-dominantly inner city brownfield sites? How-ever, the Task Force’s mission has widenedto become concerned with the regenerationdebate. The Government’s objectives are to protectthe green belt, meet the housing target andstimulate urban revival by increasing theshare of new housing built on brownfield sitesfrom 50 per cent to 60 per cent of new stock.Trying to pursue several aims at once meanssome conflict is inevitable. Urban regenera-tion clashes with the economics of brownfielddevelopment; redeveloping is expensive. Inmany places, even a 50 per cent target is notalways realistic from the developers’ point ofview. One solution advocated is to subsidisedevelopers, or individuals, moving into thecity, though this may well go against thewish to keep public spending within prudentlimits. There are two more fundamental problemsin the new urban policy. First, it is fightingsome powerful market forces. Second, con-flating urban revival with meeting housingneed risks reinforcing social exclusion in theareas with lowest housing demand, in theinner cities and across the UK.Spirals of decline in inner city estates stemfrom low demand: they also help create it. Acombination of factors, including macro-eco-nomic change, residualisation of housingstock and the sale of council properties canpush neighbourhoods into decline and dis-repair. Those who can, leave – the vacantproperties created reinforce and accelerate thedownward cycle. In some places, demand for new housingcan be very high: new research suggestsaround 23,000 people are migrating from theNorth to the South of the UK each year. Toregenerate cities across the UK, urban policywill have to fight the market: some com-mentators are very pessimistic about thechances of success. Furthermore, an area-based urban regeneration policy focused oncreating attractive new housing stock in someplaces, risks making excluded areas else-where even more undesirable: resulting aban-donment can hobble attempts at regeneration.ConclusionThere seem to be opposing forces at the heartof the new regeneration policy. Unless it iscarefully structured and combined withregeneration of all excluded areas, such ‘urbanrenaissance’ as may take place may deepenexclusion elsewhere. This puts the Govern-ment’s goal of more mixed communities atrisk. Urban policy has started to join up byfixing resources on the most deprived areasat the same time. The New Deal for Com-munities and SRB5 are a good start, but arethey enough? When jobs leave an area, hous-ing demand falls. For an urban renaissance tobecome reality, the urban jobs gap must alsobe addressed ●NEWE 6.3  2/8/99 12:54 pm  Page 132 14680041, 1999, 3, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-0041.00085 by <Shibboleth>-member@ucl.ac.uk, Wiley Online Library on [14/08/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License

All togethernow? Testing for Joined-up Urban and Regional Policy

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All togethernow? Testing for Joined-up Urban and Regional Policy

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