In the context of a bleak national economy and of a government which is avowedly hands-off, it will take all the skill and inventiveness city leaders can muster to navigate a positive path through this delicate territory.
March 2011 - NewStart
Is it time Britain's towns and cities re-drew their boundaries? Rupert Greenhalgh looks at how cities abroad have reined themselves in to maximise the benefits of economic growth.
With government happy to leave the fate of cities to market forces, where does that leave those for which growth isn’t a realistic option? Clare Goff reports
It seems that some have just discovered communities, volunteers and indeed charities as if they were not part of the fabric of society already and that society was just simply broken prior to the coalition.
I believe this community-led approach is what turns a good training provider into one that can successfully transform communities, and where trainees don’t just gain a qualification but actually become work-ready and able to fill skills gaps in the local economy.
I am fearful that it will not capture the public’s imagination in that it may just be seen as another bureaucratic administrative convenience.
For those of us who keep a pinch of salt handy on Budget Day, though, this welcome collection of ‘mays’ and ‘coulds’, which begin to put flesh on the bones of the coalition’s explicit rebalancing act, have to be seen in the context of a set of ‘wills’ that are already serving other rebalancing goals.
What is the purpose of places? For some, the purpose of places is all about an economic story of growth. This is something you can see. Places with purpose support growth. Coincidentally, they are often places of scale. The increments that make up these structures are people, buildings, neighbourhoods, money. The more you add, the bigger it gets, the better the structure. Right?
Ultimately it's about finding the opportunities for outer estates in the fast–changing policy landscape we now find ourselves in.
London is being given the chance to shape its own economic future, so why shouldn’t other cities? Chris Murray tells Austin Macauley why changes must be made to the localism bill to make that happen.
