Online Conference Write Up: Afternoon Sessions

On Wednesday 31st March 2010, over one hundred delegates from across the South West convened at the Assembly Rooms Bath for the South West Observatory’s 7th Annual Conference. The morning sessions of the event, themed around ‘Health, Wealth and Happiness: What Makes a Prosperous Region?’, sought to stimulate discussion and debate about our notions of prosperity and well-being. The afternoon took this further to consider how ‘prosperity’, in its many forms, might be realised in the South West.

• You can now access presentations which were given by clicking here.

• For a write-up of the afternoon session, compiled by the South West Observatory Core Unit team, please see below. To access the morning session, please click here.    

John Savage CBE (South West RDA Board Member and Managing Director, GWE Business West) opened with an impassioned presentation which focused on needs and poverty (in particular child poverty) within the debate. John drew upon the Government’s pledge to halve child poverty by 2010 and to abolish it by 2020 within the context of 3.8 millions children in the UK living in poverty. This, he suggested, is our biggest challenge. The presentation explained the impacts of poverty – reducing social mobility, educational achievement, health and well-being – and underlined how it above all else defines lifestyle choices, drives crime, creates intolerance, disaffection and insecurity. John presented the case of South Bristol where 20% residents live in 10% of the most deprived areas nationally, in which 8 out of 10 of the worst crime areas for the city are located and where only 22% of the jobs are to be found. Knowle West is one of the worst areas nationally for the lack of attainment amongst children. John underlined that these were the biggest challenges where some had prosperity and others didn’t. John concluded by painting the picture for those not fortunate enough to have relative prosperity, referring to the Toxteth Riots as an example of how we fail to address people’s lack of prosperity at our peril. John suggested that we need to readdress the approach to how we construct the basic building blocks for those at the bottom rung of the ladder.

Professor Katie Williams (Director of the Centre for Environment and Planning, UWE) looked at how we can build prosperity and well-being into the development of  sustainable communities in the South West. Her presentation was set in the context of large scale urban housing growth in the region – with 36% household growth and 40 urban extensions. Within this, the aim is to accommodate growth in sustainable and prosperous communities which move beyond ‘placeless’ single-use housing developments. However, despite government guidance and rhetoric we are struggling to deliver sustainable communities both in quality and in quantity. Katie highlighted this as a key challenge: how do we deliver better places? Considering what we mean by sustainable communities, the presentation stressed the need to avoid past failures such as mass social housing, poor urban and architectural design and ineffective regeneration. It argued that sustainable communities should be delivered via private, public and third sector involvement, better spatial planning through multiple delivery partners but, importantly, development which is phased over a long period of time. Katie expanded the presentation to consider how we achieve better quality and quantity for developments, looking at more sophisticated visions of what it is we want to achieve; developing a stronger evidence base; developing more sustainable and effective delivery mechanisms and really learning from places where higher quality and faster housing delivery works (for example in the Netherlands and other parts of Continental Europe). In conclusion, Katie suggested that it is possible, but very difficult, to deliver truly sustainable communities in the UK.

Jonathon Porritt CBE (Former Chair, Sustainable Development Commission; Founder, Forum for the Future) delivered the final speech on practically realising prosperity. Jonathon opened his discussion by asking what contribution will sustainability make in terms of access to paid employment, and underlined this as the most fundamental part in the whole debate. Without paid work, Jonathon stressed that we fail to deliver on the cornerstone of success: access to gainful employment. Jonathon drew upon the incredible pace of change around environmental goods and services and micro-generation, highlighting that the net contribution of sustainability was big and was projected to get bigger. Against this, there is renewed energy in government for manufacturing, which has only come about in the last 18 months. In the South West, the RDA had to work hard to make sure projects such as the Wave Hub off Cornwall made tangible gains to jobs in Cornwall and Devon. Accordingly, Jonathon suggested, this should be one of the main tests for sustainability. Jonathon looked at the opportunity posed through retrofitting older houses as part of the government’s strategy for ‘Warmer Homes: Greener Homes’ to achieve a 29% reduction in household emissions by 2020. Interventions in this area would not only create new jobs but also prove effective in terms of investment – with every £1 put in brought back twenty-fold. Jonathon suggested a scheme such as this, above other strategies such as food sustainability or sustainable tourism, is ultimately what is required to make tangible inroads to creating prosperity in a more sustainable way.

Leading up to the second panel debate, which focused on the practicalities of delivering prosperity, delegates heard briefly from Melanie Hall MBE (Regional Director for the South West, National Farmers Union) and Simon Mauger (Regional Programme Director, South West, NIACE).

In her presentation, Melanie stressed the importance of the land-based sector and the significance to the debate food and farming has. She highlighted how farmers in the South West were central to addressing these issues around prosperity and sustainability but hinted that there was a crucial need for more land-based ecologists in the region. She went on to talk about the high output from the South West, but underlined our dependence on supermarkets (through which 80% of our products are distributed) suggesting more could be done to improve local supply-chains. In summary, Melanie concluded the land-base in the region was a huge and important asset to many people.

Simon outllined an argument made earlier in the day that prosperity is underpinned by a person’s ability to take control of their own lives, suggesting that the debate came down to ‘regional competence’: "how smart the region is at meeting future challenges”. He suggested a more mature debate was needed to manage ‘ambiguity’ both around finance and the environment  – from one where politicians were perceived to ‘have all the answers’ – and that there were key issues to address around the loss of knowledge capital in the region. However, Simon referred to the scene four or five years ago where talk of well-being and prosperity would have received blank looks to highlight how far the debate had moved on in the past few years. His talk dug down into what might be the political landscape in the future and how this debate might change. He questioned what technology will mean to us in 10-20 years; a ‘staggering question’ that will become increasingly important. Technological advancement – in particular through artificial intelligence – could dramatically alter how we view what is now our ‘place’ (of work or learning).

Panellists were joined by John Betty (Strategic Director, Bath and North East Somerset) to field questions from the audience.

Q) Do we need a post-war economy? Rather than cuts, is now the time to invest?

• Jonathon Porrit (JP) fundamentally agreed and argued that  there was a huge opportunity through providing certain incentives, e.g.  around land use. Similarly off-shore wind could create Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of £550 million. Professor Katie Williams (KW) suggested that housing development, for example, work  well where Local Authorities are in a leadership / land-owner role and can positively shape development. Melanie Hall (MH) added that the problem was one of long-term investment. John Betty (JB)suggested the whole questions should be framed around the political cycle but that locally, moves were afoot to make decisions non-partisan. The key factor however is the story of ones place: in the West of England leaders have been trying to achieve a collective story around which people can rally.

Q) In order not to consume the world’s natural resources is what we need population decline rather than population growth?

• John Savage (JS) questioned how this could ever realistically be achieved. JP agreed that you cannot talk about a world of continuality where things go on ad finitum and that without imposing on the rights of women, the question of population control was of enormous importance. KW added that there were a number of issues surrounding this question which we would need to first grapple with, from spatial planning to public health.

Q) There are 3 barriers to address the issue of prosperity at the local and national level: political fearlessness; regulation; inflexibility through funding mechanisms. [supplemented by a question on the difficulty in finding funding for those in the most dire needs in society – e.g. carers]. How would the panel improve this situation?

•  JS suggested that with the centralised system, there were problems with funding being controlled by Whitehall. What might be required is a freeing up of the system, to enable decisions to be taken at a more local level. KW highlighted that regulation and finance around housing developments were enough ‘to drive anyone mad’ and that, in the current climate, teams needed to be particularly tenacious. MH added that there was a certain lack of leadership in terms of putting this case to politicians. JB stressed that in terms of political will/courage we shouldn’t underestimate the ability of our elected representatives to deliver outputs. On regulation, just keeping up with duties is a very big issue for those involved. In terms of funding, he suggested there should be more flexibility and a more devolved use of funding.  JP suggested that ‘fearlessness’ might not be as bad as one might imagine and there were strong moves in the South West to move the region to a net zero carbon footprint. He suggested that ‘Total Place’ could prove a very effective way to better join-up our thinking at the local and regional level. Simon Mauger (SM) added that there was £20 million of education projects being delivered in the region in the next 6 months.

Q) Should the South West try to get some of the relocated civil service jobs, announced in the Budget? Who should we have? Where should we put them?

•  JB said that Bath and North East Somerset would welcome a relocation from London although the area might be a net loser in terms of a relocation of the MoD. Given the culture and heritage in the region (if pressed) DCMS would be well positioned in the area.

Q) If we’re to have a healthy, wealthy and happy region, is it not the case that people need to be inspired by the region’s culture and cultural assets?  

• JB concluded that by growth we often look at volume not value and that Bath (and surrounding areas) was a great example of somewhere using its cultural and historical assets in this way.

To conclude, Martin Boddy underlined the importance of evidence in our policy making and the role of the South West Observatory in providing that evidence base - ‘We don’t do policy, but we do do evidence! And as the day’s debate had shown, the two are intimately connected.'  He reiterated the fact that how we define and measure things can in turn define our policy goals and objectives.  Without evidence, he argued, you can’t do policy and the role of the Observatory and its partners will be central as we move forward the debate on prosperity and well-being from wherever we sit in the region geographically or in terms of our organisational base.