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Some thoughts on Best City outcomes

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The only test of ‘best city’ is not a position in a league table, but some very personal answers to a complex set of questions, which may include….

  • Is this the ‘best city’ for me and my loved ones?
  • Is this the best place for me to make a life of fulfilment, dignity and pride?
  • Will I find people that are willing to challenge and support me with compassion?
  • Will I find opportunities to be stimulated, provoked and changed?
  • Will I find it possible to connect with others with whom I share a common cause?
  • Will I find the space and support to do my best work?
  • Will I find myself in a political, social and cultural system that accepts my values and beliefs?
  • Will it encourage the production of goods and services necessary for a becoming existence or will it do almost anything in pursuit of growth?
  • Will it respect and nurture micro-enterprise, sole traders, makers, community groups and individual activists as much as it ‘establishes proactive relationships’ with ‘large corporate employers’?
  • Is this a place where I can help to shape a better future for my children and theirs?
What kind of ‘city development’ processes would be necessary to allow the majority of us to be able to answer most of these questions with a yes?
Get those processes right and we might just be on course for somewhere exciting.

 

Making Progress Through Austerity

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There can be little doubt that these are relatively tough times in the UK, and the minds of many are focussed on how best to make progress when it feels like everything is being cut.

But most of those who are thinking about it are the professionals, who control budgets for the delivery of services or front-line service providers trying to figure out how to stop things getting dangerous as they are stretched further and further.  The assumption is that the job remains to be done, that they are the ones to do it, and they need to figure what they are going to do to make the best adjustments that they can.

But supposing they took a different tack?  Suppose they invited citizens in to explore the challenges that they face and how they might be met, how ordinary citizens might be able to use their resources, time, knowledge, skills and sometimes perhaps cash, to help?

So, for example, we might

  • invite citizens to explore issues around poverty in an area, and what they might be able to do about it.  And we might end up with something like Disrupting Poverty in Leeds
  • ask people to think about what they can do about empty properties in Leeds and end up with something  like Empty Homes
  • ask residents to explore how they can make a city more playful and end up with something like Playful Leeds

What might happen if we asked local people to step up and see what they might be able to do about other issues facing them, their loved ones and their neighbours like:

  • dementia care
  • sports development
  • fostering
  • elderly care
  • crime reduction
  • economic development and supporting start-up businesses
  • educational attainment
  • resettlement of offenders
  • suicide reduction
  • mental health promotion
  • and so on….

Or  we can just bundle these issues up into performance related contracts, attach our 56 pages of terms and conditions, develop it into a multi-million pound contract and pump it through the procurement process?

How might this work out at a local level?

I watched a community psychiatric nurse, working with a third sector service provider, planning home help for an elderly gentleman in the early stages of dementia.  He needed help with a weekly shop, food preparation and encouragement to take his medication.  Essentially they agreed a piece of business for the third sector to provide this basic support, paid for out of public finance.  There was no discussion of the role of neighbours in helping out.  No exploration about whether they might be able to manage a weekly shop between them, or set up a meal rota, or ensure a daily visit.

Now I don’t think this was a rare one-off.  I think our neighbourhoods are awash with opportunities for local people to engage with each other, to help and be helped, and to learn how to make a real difference to the big and small issues that beset us.

I am not saying that we don’t need specialist public services, of course we do.  But we will have to learn to do the basics for ourselves if we want to make progress.

The challenge is how can the funders possibly engage with a civic group that helps it to do something quite remarkable.  Because standard forms of procurement and project management are hardly conducive.

 

How Should We Recognise a Successful Economy?

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Seems to me that everyone thinks a ‘successful economy’ is critical to our future, but what characteristics would a ‘successful economy’ exhibit?

The Ideal?

  • It would exhibit private sector led growth
  • Environmentally sustainable
  • Reducing levels of relative poverty
  • Reducing levels of health inequalities
  • Increasing levels of health and well-being
  • Increasing levels of employment with jobs that are doing ‘good work’ or as Cllr Walshaw suggests ‘dignity of endeavour’
  • Providing opportunities to work based on the culture, skills and passions of people as well as the commercial goals and employability demands of employers
  • It would serve all people – rather than distort them to serve its demands
  • It would provide access to services necessary for all to live a becoming existence
The Current Reality?
  • It would exhibit private sector led growth

That’s it. The wealth created may then be used to build a better society.

 

 

Inward Investment – What’s the problem?

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Inward investment – the short cut to a prosperous and fair city where all of our communities can flourish?

But, what exactly is it?

It is the process where an investor believes that this is the best place to put their money to get a secure and sufficient return.  They may invest by setting up a factory or, more likely these days, an office or call centre.  And most cities employ specialist teams to attract inward investment – to present the best case for their city or region as an investment proposition.

But it can go further than this.

We may be able to offer specific incentives to investors to bring their money and their jobs to our city.  We may provide them with low or no-cost infrastructure, or other benefits such as an enterprise zone where they may enjoy high speed broadband, simplified planning requirements  and reduced business rates.

So inward investment becomes a highly competitive, and sometimes very expensive process to get those scarce investors to being their money to our city.  Inward investment teams are under pressure to deliver, and the dynamic gets interesting as sassy ‘investors’ play country off against country, region against region, city against city and even neighbourhood against neighbourhood.  But just look at the prize for the winners.  They get ‘investment‘ and even better ‘jobs‘.

But, we must remember the investment comes because there is an expectation of a return.  And it has to be a good return.  The net flow of cash over time will be out of the local economy and into the pocket of the inward investor and their shareholders.

But, inward investment brings many gifts…

Inward Investment brings Wealth to the City

This of course is true.  But it does little to distribute wealth.  It concentrates it with the lucky few.  Inequalities of wealth and health are, in my opinion, increased by inward investment rather than decreased.  It drives social stratification and is unlikely to be a great policy for a city that wants all its communities to thrive.

Inward Investment Brings Jobs to the City

This too is true.  But usually the jobs that go to local people are largely low skill, low wage. Often inward investment can increase local unemployment rather than decrease it as investment tends to create relatively few jobs and automates as much as possible.  Lets face it if employment costs are a large part of your business and you require large volumes of low skill workers then you are not going to be looking at the UK.  And if you do create high wage, high skills jobs what are the chances of local people being able to take them up?  It is likely that these jobs will go to incomers too.

Inward Investment Builds Houses

Very true.  Inward investors may take over a problem community – demolish or refurbish it and turn it into an aspirational address.  House prices are driven up and often beyond the reach of many local people

Inward Investment Creates Dependency

We become a blue collar community reliant on employers and investors.  They become powerful influence on the politics, economics and education in our communities as they demand more and more ’employability’, better and better conditions for business.  We end up with much time and energy being put into retaining our 100 largest employers and continually tipping the playing field in favour of ‘business’…. Becoming a dependent client class I believe has negative impacts on the wellbeing of community and acts as a significant barrier to the development of innate potential as we are shaped to meet the demands of employers.

Loss of Local Control

Not only are we dependent on the presence of inward investors in our communities but we cede control to them.  They manage their investments on the ground and if they choose to create redundancies in our communities there is precious little we can do about it.

Inward Investment is Fickle

The mobility of much modern business means that inward investors can go almost as easily as they come.  You might have to have very deep pockets to retain them in the face of all that competition for their ‘jobs’.

Inward Investment can Undermine Local Business

By competing for talent and skills and by driving up land values and costs beyond the reach of local independents.

It Plays a Zero Sum Game

If an inward investor moves from one part of the county to another there is not net gain in jobs.

Put More Strain on Local Services

Schools, hospitals, roads and other infrastructure may all face increasing demand as a result of inward investment. These costs are seldom met by the inward investor but is funded from other budgets.  Meanwhile in the community that the investor has just left services may lose viability and be forced to close.

It is Resource Hungry

Playing the inward investment game is a high stakes, high cost business. Renting a yacht at MIPIM and taking a high powered delegation there does not come cheap.  But that is just surface.  Someone has to pay for the business rate subsidies and the infrastructure demanded.  And every pound spent on helping an inward investor to realise a profit is a pound that is not spent elsewhere in supporting the local community and its economy.

But I am not Against Inward Investment…

It has a role to play in bringing ideas, innovation and fresh blood to our city.  What I am against is a political and business narrative that says it is really the only game in town, and one that says it is the only strategy worthy of real investment.   Instead of economic hunting perhaps we need to look at nurturing the potential our own communities a little more, and recognising that there is much more to creating sustainable and fulfilling lives than the ever increasing growth of GDP and a touching faith in the trickle down fairy.