My presentation to our New Planning Spaces conference at the University of Liverpool

1. Neighbourhood Planning in
North West England: The
Barriers to Exploring its
Progressive Potential
Presentation to New Planning
Spaces
20th June 2018
John Sturzaker

2. Contents
• Brief introduction to Neighbourhood Planning (NPing) in
England
• Criticisms of localism and NPing
• And yet…
• NPing in practice nationally
• NPing in practice within North West England
• Expected and unexpected barriers

3. NPing in England
• Introduced through legislation in 2011 (The Localism
Act), part of a broader “philosophy” of the “Big Society” in
England
• Some unusual/unique features:
– Neighbourhood Plans are optional but part of the
“statutory development plan” so carry legal weight in
decisions on planning projects
– They are produced on a voluntary basis by local
communities
– To be adopted they have to pass a neighbourhood
referendum – a vote of everybody who lives in the
area

4. NPing in England II
• “In no other case study of devolution, across a broad
international canvas, do we see so visibly the liberatory
and regulatory conflicts that arise from the assemblages
of localism, or the tangled relations of power and identity
that result” (Bradley & Brownill, 2017, p. 251).

5. Localism Predictions
• Proportion of population engaged in voluntary work
(Sutcliffe & Holt (2011):
– Affluent rural areas = 35%
– Deprived urban areas = 15%
• Therefore, “The Big Society tent is going to be occupied
largely by well-meaning, well educated people living in
nice places – mostly rural – with time on their hands”
(Hall, 2011, p.60)

6. Criticisms of localism/NPing
• Localism is part of broader trend of neoliberalism
(Featherstone et al., 2012; Hickson, 2013; Tait & Inch, 2016)
• It legitimates dispersal of power away from the state
(Newman, 2014; Crisp, 2015)
• It continues to privilege the powerful, through various means,
including that it is only open to those with time/money to spare
(Jacobs & Manzi, 2013; (Catney et al., 2014)
• It is a means to cover for cuts in public spending (Levitas,
2012; Parker et al., 2015)
• The scope for truly radical action is constrained by framing
from above (Bradley, 2015; (Ercan & Hendriks, 2013)

7. Argument for more nuance
• “Conventional analytics of neoliberalism have commonly
portrayed the impacts of these changes in the
architectures of governance [localism] in blanket terms:
as an utterly regressive dilution of local democracy; as
an extension of conservative political technology by
which state welfare is denuded in favour of market-led
individualism; and as a further politicised subjectification
of the charitable self. Such seemingly hegemonic
grammars of critique can ignore or underestimate
the progressive possibilities for creating new ethical
and political spaces in amongst the neoliberal
canvas” (Williams et al., 2014, p. 2798, emphasis
added).

8. Progressive potential?
• NP does represent a genuine shifting of power to
communities (Parker & Street, 2015; Wills, 2016)
• NP, unlike most planning activity, “addresses people’s
emotional commitment to place” (Bradley, 2017, p. 163)
• There is scope for NPs to facilitate “‘spaces of
resistance’ to certain types of development in some
communities” (Haughton et al., 2013, p. 230); NP can
“challenge rather than entrench inequalities between and
within places” (Featherstone et al., 2012, p. 180); it “can
be seen as a re-appropriation of space from the
dominant market model” (Bradley & Sparling, 2016, p.
11)

9. • Parker & Salter (2016) Of the first 1625 neighbourhood
areas:
– 91% were in parished (i.e. rural) parts of England;
proportion of plans passing referendums likewise
– 51.6% were in upper two (less deprived) Index of
Multiple Deprivation quintiles; 23.2% in lower two – so
a bias towards wealthier areas
• Evidence of domination by wealthier groups, and
reliance on the “usual suspects” (Sturzaker & Shaw,
2015)
Neighbourhood Planning in
Practice at national level

10. Neighbourhood Planning in Practice
at regional level (North West)

11. Neighbourhood Plans and
Deprivation in North West

12. Case studies

13. Initial findings
• Some barriers to neighbourhood plan in (deprived) urban
areas as expected:
– Lack of capacity (fewer white collar residents): “In
reality it will be two people doing the work”
– Lack of support structures (in rural areas, Parish
Councils have staff, budget, teams of volunteers in
place): “It’s hard because I’ve not written funding
applications before”
• Easier in less deprived urban areas – cash and in-kind
donations c. £100k in Altrincham
• Also other barriers which were not predicted…

14. Reactions from LPA officers
• Some neighbourhood plans in these areas supported by
Local Planning Authority officers “without much
enthusiasm”
• In other cases, officers were “very helpful”
• In yet others, officers apathetic
• Lack of capacity can be an issue – Local Planning
Authority planning teams very much reduced in recent
years

15. Political reactions
• In some places, activists “met with staunch opposition
from the very beginning” from Councillors and
businesses – this was “appalling”
• “Ideological approach to the whole concept” from some
Councillors. In one case, belief that the Labour party
encouraged their members to resign from the NP group
• “Councillors know best”; “some people are power crazy”;
belief that NPs are “undemocratic”
• The Mayor of Liverpool and Leader of Manchester City
Council – “Deals are done between important people”

16. Solutions?
• Education programme for Local Planning Authorities?
• Go to party conferences and talk to (shadow) ministers?
• More support from Locality/Planning Aid?
• More money – urban forums “need their hands holding”,
all but impossible for most of them to produce NPs
without consistent support from professionals throughout
the process. Yet…

17. Prospects not good
• The latest support package from Government (for 2018-
2022) maintains the basic grant for NP groups at £9k but
reallocates additional funds away from urban and
deprived areas towards places making housing
allocations
• It’s about “housing, housing, housing”, an example of
“London-centric policy making”
• The cuts in support for urban/deprived areas are
“bonkers”
• Birkenhead & Tranmere no longer qualify for support so
will not be proceeding.

19. References
• Bradley, Q. (2015) The political identities of neighbourhood planning in England, Space and Polity,
vol. 19 (2), pp. 97-109.
• Bradley, Q. (2017) A passion for place: the emotional identifications and empowerment of
neighbourhood planning, in S. Brownill & Q. Bradley (eds), Localism and neighbourhood planning:
Power to the people?, (Bristol, Policy Press), pp. 163-180.
• Bradley, Q. & Brownill, S. (2017) Reflections on neighbourhood planning: towards a progressive
localism, in S. Brownill & Q. Bradley (eds), Localism and neighbourhood planning: Power to the
people?, (Bristol, Policy Press), pp. 251-268.
• Bradley, Q. & Sparling, W. (2016) The Impact of Neighbourhood Planning and Localism on House-
building in England, Housing, Theory and Society, pp. 1-13.
• Catney, P., MacGregor, S., Dobson, A., Hall, S.M., Royston, S., Robinson, Z., Ormerod, M. &
Ross, S. (2014) Big society, little justice? Community renewable energy and the politics of
localism, Local Environment, vol. 19 (7), pp. 715-730.
• Crisp, R. (2015) Work Clubs and the Big Society: reflections on the potential for 'progressive
localism' in the 'cracks and fissures' of neoliberalism, People, Place and Policy, vol. 9 (1), pp. 1-
16.
• Ellis, H. & Henderson, K. (2013) Planning out Poverty: The reinvention of social town planning,
(London, Town & Country Planning Association and Webb Memorial Trust).
• Ercan, S.A. & Hendriks, C.M. (2013) The democratic challenges and potential of localism: insights
from deliberative democracy, Policy Studies, vol. 34 (4), pp. 422-440.
• Featherstone, D., Ince, A., Mackinnon, D., Strauss, K. & Cumbers, A. (2012) Progressive localism
and the construction of political alternatives, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers,
vol. 37 (2), pp. 177-182.

20. References II
• Hall, P. (2011) 'The Big Society and the Evolution of ideas', Town and Country Planning, vol. 80,
no. 2, pp. 59-60.
• Haughton, G., Allmendinger, P. & Oosterlynck, S. (2013) Spaces of neoliberal experimentation:
soft spaces, postpolitics, and neoliberal governmentality, Environment and Planning A, vol. 45 (1),
pp. 217-234.
• Hickson, K. (2013) The localist turn in British politics and its critics, Policy Studies, vol. 34 (4), pp.
408-421.
• Jacobs, K. & Manzi, T. (2013) New Localism, Old Retrenchment: The “Big Society”, Housing
Policy and the Politics of Welfare Reform, Housing, Theory & Society, vol. 30 (1), pp. 29-45.
• Levitas, R. (2012) The Just's Umbrella: Austerity and the Big Society in Coalition policy and
beyond, Critical Social Policy, vol. 32 (3), pp. 320-342.
• Liverpool City Council (2017) Designated Neighbourhood Areas across the city. [Online] Available
at: https://liverpool.gov.uk/media/9349/designated-areas-as-of-140815.pdf
• Newman, J. (2014) Landscapes of antagonism: Local governance, neoliberalism and austerity,
Urban Studies, vol. 51 (15), pp. 3290-3305.
• Parker, G., Lynn, T. & Wargent, M. (2015) Sticking to the script? The co-production of
neighbourhood planning in England, Town Planning Review, vol. 86 (5), pp. 519-536.
• Parker, G. & Street, E. (2015) Planning at the neighbourhood scale: localism, dialogic politics, and
the modulation of community action, Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy, vol. 33
(4), pp. 794-810.

21. References III
• Parker, G. & Salter, K. (2016) 'Five years of Neighbourhood Planning – A review of take-up and
distribution', Town and Country Planning, vol. 85, no. 5, pp. 181-188.
• Porter, L. (2013) Neoliberal planning is not the only way: mapping the regressive tendencies of
planning practice, Planning Theory & Practice, vol. 14 (4), pp. 530-533.
• Rae, A. (2015) Deprivation in Liverpool (2015) [Online] Available at:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/129567161@N06/21869279246
• Southern, A. (2014) Something is stirring in Anfield: Elite Premier League football and localism,
Local Economy, vol. 29 (3), pp. 195-212.
• Sturzaker, J. & Shaw, D. (2015) 'Localism in practice – lessons from a pioneer neighbourhood
plan in England', Town Planning Review, vol. 86, no. 5, pp. 587-609.
• Sutcliffe, R. and R. Holt (2011). Who is Ready for the Big Society? Birmingham, Consulting
InPlace.
• Tait, M. & Inch, A. (2016) Putting Localism in Place: Conservative Images of the Good Community
and the Contradictions of Planning Reform in England, Planning Practice and Research, vol. 31
(2), pp. 174-194.
• Williams, A., Goodwin, M. & Cloke, P. (2014) Neoliberalism, Big Society, and progressive localism,
Environment and Planning A, vol. 46 (12), pp. 2798-2815.
• Wills, J. (2016) Emerging geographies of English localism: The case of neighbourhood planning,
Political Geography, vol. 53 (1), pp. 43-53.

22. Thank you to the Royal Town Planning Institute for part-
funding this research
john.sturzaker@liverpool.ac.uk
Tel: +44 151 794 3109