In partnership with Karbon Homes and Bolton at Home, the NHC hosted the Levelling Up Conference on the 14th July in Leeds city centre. We brought together senior leaders for a full day conference to advance housing’s role in the core levelling up missions of improving public services, boosting living standards, restoring local pride, and empowering communities. The conference displayed the NHC’s ability to convene the sector and wider stakeholders in order the advance the voice of housing in the North on topical issues. NHC’s Chief Executive, Tracy Harrison, provided the opening address and emphasised the importance of continuing to push the levelling up agenda amid national political instability, before welcoming Lord Kerslake to give his keynote address.
Keynote address – Lord Kerslake
Lord Kerslake began his keynote address by declaring that levelling up is alive and is here to stay, but is not the highest priority for government, and other political priorities are likely to come to the fore. He reminded everyone of the many issues facing the new leadership, with war in Ukraine, Covid-19, cost of living, backlog in our public services and balance of payments amongst other issues – this will likely consume new leadership and displace priority of levelling up.
Lord Kerslake sees levelling up as a combination of both an economic analysis of this country and a political project. The political project came from the 2019 election, the sense of left behind places created a political opportunity to penetrate the red wall. He stated that this agenda doesn’t lend itself to quick resolve and that it’s a long term project through numerous political cycles. He also stated that the Levelling Up White Paper was a landmark moment in the agenda, featuring strong analysis on the system failures on why the agenda hasn’t moved forward. However, Kerslake argued that the White Paper was weak on certain detail such as on housing and pointed out that the White Paper was particularly week on execution – noting it consisted of fragmented funding and competitive bidding.
Kerslake moved on to ask where does housing sit in all of this? – he said that housing’s key issues, the ‘4 S’s’, are currently – service, sustainability, supply and safety. He remarked “we need to continue to make the argument that housing is an essential infrastructure”. Lord Kerslake gave a rallying call to all those who work in communities, transport, health, retrofit, housing and on the green agenda – that they need to have common cause and work together rather than working in silos as all these issues intersect and need to be linked. Finally, he asserted the need for flexibility of funding provided by government, even if there is not a substantial amount to give to combined authorities he said that they should have the power to decide where it goes.
The challenges and opportunities of levelling up
Ian Ankers, Executive Director Business Development, Bolton at Home – The starting point: A view from Bolton
Utilising a map of Greater Manchester showing unemployment, Ian explained the correlation between boroughs with highest unemployment linking to poor health, poor housing and high Covid-19 excess death figures. Ian argued that decisions have to be made about where specifically to target, saying that funding can’t just be given to Bolton for example, where the east and west are divided in terms of deprivation and unemployment, it needs to be more targeted within the area. He then went on to mention the resource gap in places such as Bolton, and confirmed the need for devolution to provide support and funding to targeted programs. He noted the importance of community investment in helping to bridge the resource gap, and detailed Bolton at Home’s ‘Greenworks’ project. The project will provide skills training for retrofitting homes, giving people the chance to learn how to improve homes with low carbon technology. It will also provide carbon reduction education to raise awareness of climate issues and understanding of the need to retrofit homes. The training will help to create opportunity and better outcomes in the area by assisting residents to gain key skills – improving employment, education, cost of living, and bridging the resource gap.
Charlotte Carpenter, Executive Director of Growth and Business Development, Karbon – Liveability: What makes a place worth living in?
Charlotte explained ‘liveability’ and the factors that determine it – including cost of living, health, transport, housing, salaries, crime, and government spending. She declared we need to create genuinely liveable places for communities, somewhere they feel proud to live. She asserted the importance of levelling up moving beyond the typical rhetoric of ‘jobs, jobs, jobs’ and major projects, saying we need to ensure political rhetoric actually has meaning in people’s lives. Charlotte stated that housing providers are anchor institutions that play a central role in communities and are uniquely placed to forward the rebalancing agenda. She went on to illustrate the positive work achieved through Karbon’s Stanley skills hub project. The Stanley project has provided a place for the community to come and develop skills and get advice on wellbeing and employment. Using the UK Community Renewal Fund, Karbon have been able to offer new start placements, providing paid work experience for people to upskill and improve confidence to get into long term employment. Charlotte highlighted the success of this project as many placements have ended early as people have found long term employment elsewhere. She closed by calling for anchor institutions, such as HA’s, to think big and use the big role they hold in left behind places to work together.
Naz Parkar, Director of Homes and Neighbourhoods, Kirklees Council – Tackling Inequality: Housing as the lynchpin between cost of living, climate, and health
Naz began by stating that 55% of properties in Kirklees are band C EPC, and asked if C is ambitious enough. He moved on to discuss the biggest concerns facing Kirklees residents, noting that one in five homes don’t meet decency standard and that two thirds of Kirklees tenants claim means tested benefits. Naz said this highlights that decarbonisation is not residents’ biggest concern, the cost of living is huge and further uplifts to come. He detailed some of the action taken in Kirklees – understanding the needs of tenants through place based engagement sessions to understand what tenants value most about their homes. He also detailed a 125-unit low carbon housing development and further work on retrofit and upskilling to create job opportunities. Naz argued that none of this is possible without national government offering policy certainty, appropriate funding programmes that recognise true costs and a shift in the planning system. However, he said that locally this shouldn’t stop us, we can get on with retrofit strategy, climate energy action plan, regional collaboration and production of a compelling offer to engage government, supply chain, and our communities.
Levelling Up: Inside Housing debate
The Inside Housing debate was chaired by Inside Housing’s Editor, Martin Hilditch, and featured Brian Robson (NHC), Charlotte Carpenter (Karbon), Ian Ankers (Bolton at Home) & Naz Parkar (Kirklees Council). Brian Robson opened by stating that levelling up is a newish brand for a very old issue. He also echoed Lord Kerslake in saying that what is missing most in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill is execution and delivery mechanisms – no new decent homes standards or detail on how to reduce carbon emissions. Ian Ankers said the infrastructure levy is weak and undefined and that tensions are going to be created on this. He also noted that housing is very varied in terms of quality and decarbonising potential, is not the same across the board so upgrades need to be targeted correctly.
Naz Parkar noted that capacity is a major issue in local authorities and is not going to get better – austerity hit very hard, many areas have struggled in recruitment market to rebuild capacity and salaries aren’t competitive enough. He urged housing providers to share knowledge and queried whether HA’s could offer to produce housing strategies for local authorities as LA’s would welcome this with ongoing capacity issues. Parkar also stated that CA Mayors having control on the funding pot is a key and also said that devolution is often about the powers and flexibility that they get rather than the funding. Charlotte Carpenter highlighted that housing tends not to feature in debates on economic development, housing is rarely embraced as a driver of the economy. We need to put housings role in rebuilding economies at the centre of the agenda, in a proactive way. Finally, Naz Parkar discussed rent payments and called for housing providers to find a solution on this before it causes a standoff. He said that if housing providers go for double digit rent settlement, they’re part of the problem, not the solution.
What next for place and placemaking? – George Payiatis, Senior Urban Designer, Create Streets
George began by highlighting the importance of how residents feel about their area, he noted that everyone knows what a nice street looks like. He explained that Create Streets are pushing back on reliance of cars and roads, arguing that we have to be more sensible with how we design our estates and streets. He questioned whether every household need two cars and two parking spaces and asserted that you can include parking in the streetscape that is overlooked and blends in, meaning it isn’t a ‘concrete nightmare’. George went on to highlight why design and placemaking matter for residents, saying that health and wellbeing are reliant on place. Environment and beauty of surrounding area impact our lives greatly so it’s vital we get placemaking right for residential areas. He also stated the importance of social interactions in communities and providing spaces that help to create cohesion where communities can connect. People are more likely to connect on streets with less cars, smaller roads and front gardens providing easier access to each other and walkable neighbourhoods with a sense of community. George also highlighted the negative impact of segregating social housing within estates, stating that social housing should be integrated, or else could cause segregation and discourage pride of place.
During the afternoon, delegates were given the opportunity to join one of three themed workshops. Workshop 1 was titled ‘Pay, jobs and living standards’ and centred on housing providers and employability. The session was chaired by Christine Paxton (Karbon), with a panel consisting of Cedric Boston (CEO, Unity HA), Stuart Clarke (Your Homes Newcastle), Naomi Clayton (Learning and Work Institute) and Karel Williams (University of Manchester).
Workshop 2 focused on ‘Local pride & belonging’, discussing regeneration neighbourhoods to restore community vibrancy. The workshop was chaired by Ian Ankers with contribution from Tom Bridges (ARUP) and Charlie Norman (CEO, MSV).
Workshop 3 looked at ‘Empowering communities’ and working with citizens to improve local agency. This final workshop was chaired by Naz Parkar, with a panel of Jessie Joe Jacobs (Involve), Tiffany Holloman and Andrew Wilson – Co-Directors at Same Skies Think Tank.
The full day conference came to a close with Tracy Harrison, Charlie Norman (Group Chief Executive, MSV) and the chairs from each workshop, reflecting on the points made and key themes throughout the day. All agreed on the importance of working together and bringing a compelling offer to government to ensure that they are engaged and willing to provide funding. A common theme of the day was the link between decent housing, health, unemployment and education – and the need for these to be addressed collectively if the levelling up agenda is to progress. The projects detailed by Ian, Charlotte & Naz at their respective housing providers illustrated what can be achieved at a local level through community engagement and understanding the issues that residents see as a priority. Tracy remarked that she felt the conference was timely, with the cost of living crisis and current instability in government, ensuring that the new Conservative leadership will continue to advance the levelling up missions is vital.
The conference resource page is available now. Follow this link for a full event summary, presentation slides and short videos of the speakers discussing the themes of the day
