Housing: What on earth is the localism bill?

by Stephen Reynolds

The Localism Act is one of the Coalition Government's flagship pieces of legislation. It's about handing power back to local councils, giving communities a say in how they're run, giving you the chance to get your voice heard in how you are governed. But, the question is, if it's so great, why have you most probably never heard of it or know what it does? To be honest I'm not completely sure but I'll tell you a bit of what I know about how it affects planning policy.

@WeLoveLocalGov

Government passed the act on 2011. This gave lots of power to local councils and communities. One of these powers was to give communities the power to have a say in how planning policy is made in their area. A group of local residents (between 21 and 28 people that must include local councilors and business representatives) assemble themselves and put together a 'Neighbourhood Plan'. In this they go through a defined area ('their neighbourhood') and decide what their area should consist of and what it should be like.



Once they've decided on the Neighbourhood plan they put it to local referendum, if it passes by 50% plus 1 it becomes planning legislation that has to be followed in their area. Easy. Right?

I'm afraid to say not quite. There are a lot of complexities to the process. Between 2011 and today only one community in Cumbria has got to the stage of their referendum passing, and that was in March this year. There are many layers of planning policy that these groups have to adhere too in their community plan. The National Planning Policy framework was released in 2012 and is national government's latest guidelines on how planning should work. On top of this there is local council planning policy as well as other regulation levels that have to be understood by the group of volunteers that make up the Neighbourhood Planning Team. To give an example of how hard this can be, Croydon's planning guidelines alone are just shy of 200 pages. Once this is understood the next problem is reaching a consensus that will then pass referendum within the local community. Then you have to actually get local people to care enough to go out and vote in favour of your Neighbourhood Plan. Finally there's the problem of what do you actually do with the plan once it's been passed? Without companies actually wanting to invest in your area either to develop business or build housing your neighbourhood plan is, well, pretty pointless. To top it all off there is no funding to support any of this and only a few stretched organisations that can support local people to do this.

Localism Act

So, you may ask, what is the point in this? This legislation is a great opportunity for people to engage positively in the planning process. Currently people see planning as a negative process; 'I don't want that here' or 'Not in my backyard'. This gives the opportunity for people to say 'I want my community to look like this' or 'My housing estate should look like that'. As well as this positive engagement people can have, the planning group has to engage with the local community in a consultation exercise and a consensus has to be reached in order for the plan to be passed into regulation through the referendum. This consultation and consensus reaching can be long winded but means that the plan has the largest amount of support.

So, I may not have educated you much more on the localism bill but I at least hope this has piqued your interest. This government legislation has the power to revolutionise the way people look at planning and really have an input into the physical aspect of their local communities but there are barriers to overcome on the way.

Locality, a nationwide network of development trusts, and community enterprises, can help support Neighbourhood plan groups:

Locality

Housing: The way we live now

Just over a week ago nine of us got together to do the second ever "Ordinary Experts" event. Our topic was "housing" and it was very interesting to see how we all interpreted that and the variety of different topics we prepared to share with each other on the day, from schools and their effects on house prices, to housing for adults with learning disabilities to a poetry session on the theme of "home". We each had approximately 20 minutes to share our chosen topic in whatever format suited it best. Over the coming weeks we will be posting blogs on the themes that we covered, please join in with the conversation and leave a comment.

Round Up Feb 2012

Startling statistics:

Troubled families

Brilliant ideas:

India's food king

The UNICEF brick

Wonderbags

Clever collaborations:

Gamers decode AIDS protein

Inspiring organisations:

Free cakes for kids

Growzones

Intriguing articles:

Making wealth history?

The prettiest handbag will not save the world

A safer humanitarian air drop

Crises of capitalism

Pick of the blogs:

Living with rats: exploring better ways to live 

Do the green thing

The fun theory

Recession: Poor Giving

So my talk was entitled “Poor Giving”. I came across a charity, through a friend, called GiveDirectly, which was set up by a load of PhD economics boffins from Harvard and MIT. The aim of the charity is to give money directly to a poor household in Kenya. What I will do is bombard you with information about this project and leave it to you to mull over and think about the questions which I will leave this on. I hope that even if it does not help us (Britain) it will most certainly help those in third world countries.

• Select regions of Kenya with high poverty rates using census data. 

• Villages are then identified with low-quality housing and access to someone who can provide mobile-phone-based payment services. 

• Finally, the poorest households in these villages are found using simple, transparent criteria: households living in homes made out of mud, wood, and grass. These criteria effectively identify relatively poor households and are generally perceived by the community as fair. Eligible households' phone numbers are recorded or, for those that do not have a phone, provide them with a SIM card. 

• The money is then moved from using M-PESA accounts (mobile payment system). The recipient gets an SMS text message reminding them of the transfer.

1. So can GiveDirectly help get not only households but whole countries out of the poverty line? Could it be applied to all households in a third world country, or just those below the poverty line?

1. What would be the negative effects if GiveDirectly worked on a national scale? Would it drive up prices in more westernised society?

1. Could GiveDirectly work for the UK (say if a billionaire gave each person/family/poor household £2000)?

During an economic crisis we are all strapped for cash, yet it is cash that helps us get out of this crisis. So because there is less cash, aid, whether financial (in the form of investments), medical, food or shelter is not as much donated to the third world. Because of this third world countries have had to cut in areas like us, this, for example has affected the treatment of HIV patients in Africa. (SOURCE) It took longer for the crisis to hit third world countries but now it has hit like the rest of us because the country was trying to westernise itself and incorporate itself into the western markets. Because exports as well, which are made in third world countries declines, the poorest of those countries have, had, and are having some of the worst times. (SOURCE) 

Each household chosen, receives $2000 over a period of two years. This is often split up into quarterly instalments.

This is the criteria in which people are chosen to receive the money:

So how efficient is this aid system, compared to more mainstream aid? The American Institute for Philanthropy rates charities that spend more than 60% of their budget on "program services" as "satisfactory" and those that spend more than 75% as "highly efficient." Note that the "program services" category includes operational costs; by that definition, the GiveDirectly charity spend 100% of donations on program services.

What about investing and saving the money given to the recipients? Recipients often save or invest a large proportion (50%-80%) of the transfers they receive, depending in part on whether the transfer was short-term or ongoing. (SOURCE)  

Health Care: Many studies find positive effects on the health of children as measured using anthropometric techniques - for example, children's height-for-age and weight-for-height.

Is there abuse of any of the cash which is given? The poor do not abuse cash as predicted by derogatory stereotypes. Across a range of studies, spending on alcohol and tobacco either decreases, stays constant, or at most increases in proportion with other spending (typically 2-3%). Similarly, most studies find no effect on the number of hours worked. Some studies show increases in working hours as household members migrate to obtain better jobs. 

Here is some interesting numbers to crunch:

What about micro-loans? While micro-loans may be helpful in lifting households out of poverty, research suggests that this is likely true only for certain households. One potential reason is the high rates of interest (up to even 100% per year) charged on micro-loans due to the costs of administering and monitoring many small loans. These high interest rates limit the benefit to the household of obtaining a sum of money to spend or invest. Also the term structure of micro loans, which requires that borrowers begin making repayments as soon as 1 week later, may induce households to invest loans in activities that generate income relatively quickly, such as a small vending enterprise, rather than long-term investments, such as in their health or the education of children. Another concern with microfinance is that the poorest households can't afford high rates of interest and lenders will not give them loans. GiveDirectly seeks to fill this gap by providing assistance to those too poor to access microfinance.

Is giving cash, sustainable? Usually when the word "sustainable" is applied to charity, it means that a gift "keeps on giving" and that donors need not continue to make gifts to the same recipient. Since many GiveDirectly grant recipients use some or all of the money to invest in small enterprises, many of GiveDirectly's grants are "sustainable." Indeed, one study of unconditional cash transfers in Mexico found that that household incomes increased by between 1.5 and 2.6 times the amount of the transfers due to the returns from increased investment, suggesting that cash transfers are more than sustainable. Beyond short run income changes, investments in adequate food, proper clothing, better health or more education for children may be "sustainable" in the long run; even though it will require charity until that child is done with school, he or she will grow up much better off and needing much less assistance than his or her parents. 

Should there be more controls/conditions when giving the cash? GiveDirectly intentionally provides unconditional, rather than conditional, cash transfers. We do this for three reasons. First, empowering the poor to make their own decisions advances our core value of respect. Second, it lets recipients purchase the things they need most, enhancing impact. Third, imposing conditions on the use of funds requires that costly monitoring and enforcement structures be put in place. One detailed estimate put the administrative costs of a conditional cash transfer scheme at 63% of the transfers made over the first three years of the program (rather than current 10% administrative costs for unconditional cash offers).

Department for International Development in 2011 said that: Cash transfers were one of the more thoroughly researched forms of development intervention. They conducted a 130 page review (available on the GiveDirectly website). There were many positives from this but a draw back was that: ‘There is also a need for greater understanding on the impact of cash transfers for improving access to a broader range of public services. For example, cash transfers may have an impact on water and sanitation, by helping households to afford clean water and better sanitation, although this has rarely been measured.’

Give Directly Website

Recession: A growthless economy

Here is a brief introduction to a new idea of an economy without growth, being put forward by Jeremy Williams' Beyond Growth Campaign. Much of the information below has come from Jeremy's blogs and websites. I am not writing as an expert, but I do think the idea merits thinking and discussion. 

The basic premise is that our earth cannot provide the resources needed for the whole world to continue to grow indefinitely, and that this principle should be applied to financial economies as well as physical resources that we use. There are a wide number of areas that could be included within this eg fuel, space to grow food, materials for building, job availability, social structure limits, and the big picture is very broad, but the principle of pursuing something other than growth seems to be new and counter cultural and that is why it's interesting. 

Some key differences between an economy seeking to grow and a post-growth economy seeking stability are as follows:

• A stable economy seeks to stabilise resource use to a sustainable value. A growing economy sees cycles of boom and bust (this recession is just one example of such a cycle). 

• Growing economies borrow money in order to achieve growth, and the debt accrued can only be paid off by the dividends of the growth. A stable economy would no longer be able to borrow as it would have no growth to pay the debt off - we would be stuck with our national debt indefinitely. 

• A growing economy is measured by financial properties such as GDP. Success of a post-growth economy would need to be measured in non-financial terms such as health, efficiency, environmental impact or happiness. 

• Our growing economy has not been able to reduce the poverty gap in this country over the last 20 years. A stable economy would aim to prioritise reduction of the poverty gap to fit in with the measurements that are now given value above. 

• Our current economy trades globally, whereas a stable economy would be locally focussed on a much smaller scale and would be characterised by simple living, having less and working fewer hours. 

• Growing economies are still important in LEDCs where infrastructure, life expectancy, education levels and other quality of life measures have much to benefit from it, but should developed countries now be seeking a sustainable future? 

• Is this realistic? It sounds great, but will it offer the equality of wealth and resources that is suggested?

• What will the picture look like for banks, new businesses, manufacturing?

• What does 'living simply' mean? How simple is simple enough? 

• How do we measure successful simplicity?

• How do we motivate a country to change it's behaviour and living conditions? Financial incentives? Ecological concern? Legislation? How 'communist' do you want to be?

• Will our country even be able to sacrifice its money, stuff and conveniences? Can we change what a country considers to be valuable in time?  

• How do we encourage LEDCs to embrace a post-growth future when growth is still working so well to improve quality of life?

• Jeremy Williams' Beyond Growth Campaign and Make Wealth History blog

• Happy Planet Index - a brilliant website from the NEF charting measurements other than GDP

The post-growth theory is not without opposition and challenges, and without serious government interest is still far off being in a position to provide details and specifics of how it might practically come to be. A short but good discussion digging into some of these issues between 'post-growth Jeremy' and Sam Bowman from the Adam Smith institute was on the Radio 2 Jeremy Vine show on January 25th and can be found here. 

Some questions the [Ordinary Experts] and I have been asking in response to the post-growth idea include:

So all very interesting, but possibly still in the 'idealistic' stages, and it's worth remembering I've only presented one side to the discussion here. What are your thoughts?

Related links:

Recession: Carbon Crunch?

Here is a simple introduction to what has become a complicated but potentially exciting alternative economy: carbon credits.

Claims and predictions of anthropogenic climate change are based on data such as shown in this diagram sourced from NOAA via this wikipedia page. Over the past century atmospheric carbon dioxide has risen dramatically in correlation with changes in annual global temperature. As of yet there are no signs of this trend stabilising and so we should expect further climate change in the near future.

Atmospheric CO₂ concentrations and global annual
average temperatures over the years 1880 to 2009.

Climate is the term used to describe patterns in temperature and seasonality on a regional and global scale. Weather is what effects people on a local and temporal scale. Extreme weather events are predicted to be more likely under projections of climate change, although it is impossible to take a particular weather event and prove that is has been cause by climate change -there is a somewhat smaller chance, but still a chance that it could have occurred anyway.

Climate scientists predict the countries to be most effected by raised temperatures and extreme weather are those around the tropics. And already we hear news reports of unusual droughts and weather events in East Africa; Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia. These and other such countries are most likely to be negatively effected by climate change and yet are the least responsible for increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. 

The schematic below describes just this. The scale shows the average ecological footprint of citizens in each country (with dark red being the highest). This is because of the industrialisation of these mostly Northern nations using fossil fuels and other resources. In the South where ecological footprints are very small there is little industrialisation and limited resource use due to subsistence life styles.

But what these Southern countries have is large resources of biomass; rain forests, peat swamps, coastal forests, mangroves and coral reefs. These are the lungs of the earth and provide a crucial role in extracting carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere in real time and storing it in biomass or laying it down in the earth. We, in the North, are benefiting from these green resources in the South but are paying nothing towards the services we are receiving, while the Southern countries are crippled in poverty and the only way out appears to be removing these green resources to enable industrialisation.

The idea of a Carbon Credit is that:

 “...someone values carbon being stored in the earth from the atmosphere for a certain amount of money...”

 This has been operating voluntarily for a number of years now, where you have the option to alleviate your carbon guilt by paying for trees to be planted when you take an air flight for example. The proposal to formalise this exchange is referred to as REDD+ . Money could be transferred from industrialised nations to developing nations in exchange for 

R - reduced  

E - emissions  from 

D - degradation  and 

D – deforestation.

Current models direct the money to grass roots organisations such as indigenous forest peoples who live on the land in return for their stewardship and sustainable use of the forest.

So what do you think? Do you think this will work? Is it a brilliant new way to transfer aid that will promote poverty alleviation and environmental action? What effect will a global recession have on these plans?

Read more about this by following these links:

Wikipedia: attribution of recent climate change

The UN REDD program

Wikipedia: REDD

REDD in the newsk

Recession: Our communities and us

The landscape of the UK is changing. Concepts like the Big Society combined with a whole raft of legislation in which devolution of power and decentralization of services will take place means that things are going to operate at a much more local level. We can argue whether this approach is good or bad, and that would be interesting, but with cross party support we can conclude that it’s here to stay.

Couple this with a deficit in funds and significant cutbacks and it seems clear that there are going to be gaps. Services that we may want the government to fund and provide, i.e. youth services, are likely to no longer operate (or even exist) in the same way. This leaves us in a situation in which if we believe that these services should be provided in our communities then we will have to do something about it.

So I’d like you firstly, to draw a picture of yourself.

Now around it, I’d like to you to write what your skills and talents are; what can you offer?

Now put that to one side.

Take another piece of paper. This time, I’d like you to map out your community in whatever way you want to; be creative. I’d like you to label what the strengths and needs of the community are.

Now find the image of yourself. Look at it and now match up the needs of your community with your skills. What can you offer?

Wait, we haven’t finished there. What are your needs? What is it that your life is lacking right now; the things that make you happy? How can your community fulfil your needs?

Our communities need us. They need us to participate, to engage, to bring whatever skills we have. There are going to be gaps and it’s going to need us (all of us, not just the people sat here) to fill them.

However, sometimes we get so fixated on being useful and ‘fixing’ things that we forget that we also have needs. It seems to me that it’s not about taking over or trying to lead or assuming that we have all the answers. But instead believing that we may be part of the solution, rather than the whole; recognising that other people may hold the pieces we lack.

In believing this, we may find that the pieces held by others may be answers to our own needs as well as our communities.