Co-operative Party General Secretary, Joe Fortune, explains how community ownership can help revive the struggling British high street.
We all know how important our local assets are to our communities. Whether that be the local pub, shop, music venue, cinema or leisure centre, its places like these that make up the social fabric of communities across the country – bringing people together and acting as the backdrop to our lives.
However, over recent years the sad decline of the British high street paired with the UK’s stunted economic growth has meant our communities are being hollowed out of the assets that we all find important. Communities are losing the assets that matter the most to them. Something must change – and for us in the Co-operative Party, that’s where community ownership steps in.
By giving local people ownership of pubs, shops, and football clubs, it allows them to directly operate as well as own them for the long term – giving communities a real say and stake in the places which make somewhere home.
This idea isn’t a new concept by any means. With over 11,000 community businesses operating in England, community ownership is already emerging as a transformative approach to local economic development. In recent years, we’ve seen local people from Bury to Cornwall come together to buy at-risk pubs, shops, and other community assets – and revive them through community ownership. Places like the Vale of Aeron pub in Ceredigion or even the stunning Keighley and Worth Valley Railway in West Yorkshire have been saved through the power of their local community coming together to take ownership.
However, to get to this stage, it’s a hard-fought and sometimes lengthy battle. Communities across the country are having to jump through a series of hoops, fight against endless red tape and raise enough money to make their dream of owning a piece of their local area a reality. It really shouldn’t be this hard for local people to invest in their local area. However, in practice, it is.
The numbers also speak for themselves. Since the Community Ownership Fund was set up by the Government as part of their ‘Levelling Up’ agenda, there have been less than 200 successful acquisitions of local assets made by local groups.
At present, it almost feels like the system is set up for communities to fail. That’s why last week, the Co-operative Party was proud to publish the new Unleashing Community Ownership report by the Community Ownership Commission, which seeks to set out how the current system could be reformed in communities’ favour.
Led by former chief economist at Ernst and Young, Mark Gregory, the report lays out a practical set of policies which could unlock the huge potential of community ownership and power across the country.
Because what is needed is not another Hunger Games-style system like we currently see in our politics, where your postcode determines how much money you will receive and communities must compete for ever-dwindling funding. Instead, communities need and, more importantly, want real autonomy over the places they call home – backed with financial instruments to do so. The proposals in the report would give communities a real say and stake and gives an incoming Labour government the steps to make it possible.
The right to bid for assets of community value – the pubs, historic buildings, football clubs – would be replaced by a powerful new Community Right to Buy – allowing first refusal for assets of community value and the right for communities to buy them without competition. The system would also be extended to long-term vacant high street property too.
The report also suggests better funding for communities, a move to place-based funding and reshaping local engagement – so local authorities can work with communities to help them take ownership of assets to drive economic growth.
We know that ownership shapes local economies by determining who shares in its rewards – and we say it is finally time for communities to benefit from the wealth they help create. Through trusting the community and working with the community, we can find the right balance to bring economic growth and jobs while also protecting the spirit and fabric of the places we call home.
