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HOMES FOR SCOTLAND'S PEOPLE: A Scottish Housing Policy Statement

SECTION 5 COMMUNITIES - BUILDING STRONG, SAFE AND ATTRACTIVE COMMUNITIES

OUR ACTIONS

WE HAVE MADE A SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTION TO REGENERATION THROUGH HOUSING INVESTMENT VIA THE COMMUNITIES SCOTLAND DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME AND NEW HOUSING PARTNERSHIPS.

WE HAVE LEGISLATED TO TACKLE ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR AND ITS IMPACT ON COMMUNITIES.

WE HAVE INVESTED £120 MILLION THROUGH THE BETTER NEIGHBOURHOOD SERVICES FUND TO IMPROVE PUBLIC SERVICES IN SCOTLAND'S MOST DISADVANTAGED COMMUNITIES. THIS INVESTMENT HAS INCLUDED NEIGHBOURHOOD ENVIRONMENTAL IMPROVEMENTS AND £29 MILLION TO IMPROVE COMMUNITY SAFETY AND REDUCE ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR.

WE HAVE FUNDED OVER 1300 PROJECTS THROUGH SOCIAL INCLUSION PARTNERSHIPS AS A CENTRAL FEATURE OF OUR TARGETED PARTNERSHIP APPROACH TO REGENERATING COMMUNITIES.

WE HAVE CREATED A SINGLE, OUTCOME-FOCUSED COMMUNITY REGENERATION FUND TARGETED AT SCOTLAND'S MOST DEPRIVED NEIGHBOURHOODS.

WE ARE INVESTING £20 MILLION IN 2004-06 IN THREE PATHFINDER URBAN REGENERATION COMPANIES IN CRAIGMILLAR, CLYDEBANK AND RAPLOCH.

WE HAVE SET A TARGET TO PROMOTE THE COMMUNITY REGENERATION OF THE MOST DEPRIVED NEIGHBOURHOODS THROUGH IMPROVEMENTS BY 2008 IN EMPLOYABILITY, EDUCATION, HEALTH, ACCESS TO LOCAL SERVICES, AND QUALITY OF THE LOCAL ENVIRONMENT.

OUR PLANS

WE WILL INVEST AROUND £470 MILLION IN THE REGENERATION OF DEPRIVED COMMUNITIES OVER THE NEXT THREE YEARS TO TACKLE THE POVERTY AND EXCLUSION WHICH STILL BURDEN FAR TOO MANY NEIGHBOURHOODS IN SCOTLAND.

WE WILL CONTINUE TO ENSURE THAT HOUSING INVESTMENT IS LINKED INTO OUR REGENERATION PRIORITIES THROUGH THE TARGETED MANAGEMENT OF OUR AFFORDABLE HOUSING INVESTMENT PROGRAMME.

WE WILL INTRODUCE HOUSING RENEWAL AREAS AS A MEANS OF ENCOURAGING A MORE COMPREHENSIVE APPROACH TO TACKLING HOUSING RENEWAL IN AREAS OF POOR OR DECLINING STANDARDS.

WE SHALL EXAMINE EVIDENCE ON THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ALLOCATIONS, TENANCY SUSTAINMENT AND AREA REGENERATION AND CONSIDER WHETHER GUIDANCE ON ALLOCATIONS POLICY AND PRACTICE IS REQUIRED.

WE INTEND TO PUBLISH A POLICY STATEMENT ON REGENERATION BY SUMMER 2005 TO GENERATE A WIDE-RANGING DEBATE ON THE WAY AHEAD.

THE NATURE OF THE CHALLENGE

5 .1 We want all of Scotland's communities to have economic, social and environmental vitality; to be prosperous and successful; and to be places where people can influence the planning and delivery of services and help shape the issues which affect them. Decent, affordable homes are a key part of this along with access to learning and employment opportunities, good quality public, private and voluntary services which meet people's needs and a quality built and natural environment where people feel safe and have a sense of identity and pride in the place they live.

5 .2 Achieving this in communities across Scotland is challenging:

• in disadvantaged neighbourhoods where combined and concentrated deprivation can limit people's routes out of poverty and especially their employment opportunities.
• in fragile rural communities where affordable housing for local people is an issue.
• in pressured areas where economic growth presents particular challenges in terms of affordable housing and the labour market.

5 .3 Past experience shows that investment in the quantity and quality of housing is not, on its own, enough to ensure sustainable communities or bring about lasting improvements to neighbourhoods and the quality of life of individuals and families. This requires joined-up policies, investment and action across a range of economic, social, physical and environmental issues. At the local authority level, Community Planning Partnerships have the lead role. This co-ordinated approach aims to deliver:

• access to economic opportunities (e.g. through new businesses and improved transport) and the skills and support (e.g. training and child care) to take advantage of them.
• appropriate infrastructure and commercial and industrial property.
• improvements to the local environment, open spaces and facilities.
• good quality and responsive public services (e.g. education, health and neighbourhood services such as street cleaning, roads and lighting and police).
• safer communities.
• genuine community engagement in shaping the place they live.

5 .4 Delivering these outcomes is especially challenging in Scotland's most deprived areas - those ranked in the most deprived 15% identified in the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation 2004. This is why we have a specific Closing the Opportunity Gap target for community regeneration of the most deprived neighbourhoods.

• 144,000 (33%) of the 435,000 employment deprived people in Scotland live in the most deprived 15% of neighbourhoods. In other words, someone living in one of Scotland's most deprived areas is more than twice as likely to be employment deprived as someone living in the rest of Scotland.
• 294,000 (39%) of the income deprived people in Scotland live in the most deprived 15% of neighbourhoods. Again, someone living in one of Scotland's most deprived areas is more than twice as likely to be income deprived as someone living in the rest of Scotland.

5 .5 While the most deprived areas are similar to the rest of Scotland in terms of what residents like about them, there are stark differences in terms of what they dislike, with much greater dissatisfaction with quality of life issues such as the local environment, vandalism and the behaviour of young people (Source: Scottish Household Survey).

BALANCED TENURE

5 .6 One of the most striking aspects of Scotland's most deprived areas is the concentration of social rented housing within these areas. In the most deprived areas two out of three households are social rented, while in the least deprived nine out of 10 households are owner occupied.

5 .7 This tenure mix, or lack of it, within deprived communities results from:

• the most disadvantaged and vulnerable being dependent on social housing.
• concentrations of social housing in particular locations reflecting historical building patterns.

5 .8 These factors combine and interact so that social housing and concentrations of deprivation often go hand in hand. We will therefore consider as a matter of high priority the development of specific guidance for any landlords wishing to implement choice-based lettings. We will also examine if and how allocation policies impact on our area regeneration and tenancy sustainment objectives.

INVESTING IN COMMUNITIES

5 .9 The challenge at a national and local level is to create better mixed, economically viable and sustainable communities. This requires joined-up investment in housing, in jobs and services and in the local environment.

5 .10 Since 1999 SIP (Social Inclusion Partnership) Fund expenditure of almost £370 million has been used to support a range of projects and services. These include action to address employability issues, improve health, improve educational attainment and reduce crime as well as support community involvement. We have also invested a further £121 million between 2001 and 2004 through the Better Neighbourhood Services Fund (BNSF) to improve services in disadvantaged communities. The new Community Regeneration Fund (CRF) will build on the best elements of SIPs and BNSF and provide a more strategic focus on developing and delivering targeted outcomes through Community Planning Partnerships for the benefit of the most disadvantaged.

5 .11 We are providing major investment to improve the quantity and quality of Scotland's housing over the next three years. The Executive is also developing an Employability Framework and working with local partners, especially in areas with high levels of benefit claimants and low levels of economic activity, to reduce the number of workless people across Scotland. This complements the substantial resources already being invested by the UK Government, the Scottish Executive and others to help workless people. Indeed, the Executive, enterprise networks, local authorities and local agencies invest around £110 million per annum through a variety of programmes such as Training for Work and Working for Families.

5 .12 In total, around £470 million will be invested over the next three years in an integrated programme of initiatives to help revitalise Scotland's most deprived communities. This includes major programmes such as:

• £318 million through the Community Regeneration Fund and associated Regeneration Outcome Agreements.
• £33 million for urban regeneration companies.
• £36 million to improve vacant and derelict land.
• £40 million through the Working for Families programme to help disadvantaged parents in deprived areas and groups into work by ensuring that availability of childcare is not a barrier to entering education, training or employment.

5 .13 This complements our support for a range of major physical regeneration projects as well as many locally-driven regeneration projects which have a significant housing element, providing practical opportunities to link housing investment with training and employment opportunities and the wider regeneration agenda of delivering balanced and sustainable communities.

REGENERATION - TRANSFORMING OLD MONKLAND

The Old Monkland area of Coatbridge has been transformed from an area where people queued to get out of to an area where people now queue to get in.

Old Monkland was one of the first regeneration priorities identified by North Lanarkshire Council which secured £8.5 million of New Housing Partnership Programme funding in 1998. To take this forward a partnership was formed involving the local authority, Clyde Valley Housing Association and private developers. Together, these organisations worked closely with local people to drive forward the project. Following a successful ballot of tenants 500 flats were transferred to the Association in 1999.

Since then remarkable progress has seen all the original flats demolished with 335 new houses built for rent and 135 for sale. All the homes meet secure by design and barrier free standards. Just as important as the physical transformation of the area has been the resurgence of community pride and increase in community involvement, perhaps best illustrated by the success of the Play Strategy Group who have been developing facilities and activities for young people in the area. At the same time the Building Futures in Lanarkshire project has been working to help local people access employment and training opportunities created by the regeneration work.

5 .14 Many of Scotland's most deprived areas are characterised by low demand and consequent high rates of empty properties. These are partly due to a mismatch between the type, size and quality of housing available and what people want, but also due to wider problems which may mean people do not want to live in particular areas. Demolition may sometimes be the most viable and sustainable option for particular neighbourhoods. Housing Renewal Areas will provide a way of dealing with these issues in the private sector.

5 .15 Where concentrations of poor quality housing exist it is often more effective to look at improving an area as a whole rather than focus on individual houses. The traditional area-based approach to tackling such problems in the private sector involved Housing Action Areas but the narrow definition of such areas did not give local authorities the flexibility to intervene in instances where amenity was affected or where there was market failure but not necessarily a deterioration in the quality of individual houses. The Housing Renewal Area powers we are proposing in the Housing Bill will allow local authorities to take a more comprehensive approach to the renewal of private housing in an area of poor or declining standards. We will expect local authorities, when using these powers, to take account of and support broader strategies for community regeneration.

COMMUNITY SUPPORT AND TENANT INVOLVEMENT

5 .16 Effective housing management has a key role in supporting sustainable communities. This goes beyond managing the stock and providing good quality and efficient services to tenants. It includes supporting tenants to help them exercise their rights and fulfil their responsibilities as well as a wider role for RSLs in working with other public, private and voluntary organisations to, for example, improve neighbourhood management and tackle particular issues such as anti-social behaviour and domestic violence. The Antisocial Behaviour (Scotland) Act 2004 requires that RSLs are consulted on local strategies to prevent and deal with anti-social behaviour. This is in their interests in terms of protecting their properties and their good tenants, as well as those suffering from incidences of anti-social behaviour.

5 .17 RSLs have a strong tradition of involving and empowering residents. Many RSLs have tenant majorities on their governing bodies and about half of the 2,230 voluntary committee members who manage RSLs are local tenants. Communities Scotland requires all RSLs to publish and implement sound participation strategies in all areas of their work. Rightly, residents are playing an active role in shaping their communities.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF LAND USE PLANNING

5 .18 The planning system can play an important role in supporting the development of new and regenerated mixed communities. Scottish Planning Policy 3: Planning for Housing sets out our policy to encourage "more diverse, attractive, mixed residential communities, both in terms of tenure and land use". Planning authorities should be looking, in preparing their development plans,
to identify suitable sites for mixed-use developments. It will also be appropriate, within larger sites, to consider the range of densities of development which can be accommodated. As a potential route to mixed tenure development, planning authorities should identify affordable housing requirements in development plans.

REGENERATION - REVITALISING ARDLER, DUNDEE

Previously a 1960s peripheral housing estate, exhibiting many of the symptoms of deprivation, Ardler is the subject of a major regeneration project involving the local community and partner agencies in Dundee. The replacement of poor quality prefabricated and multi-storey properties is helping to address the over provision of poor quality flats in Dundee.

The regeneration consists of both physical and social regeneration involving Sanctuary (Scotland) Housing Association and a wide range of community regeneration projects co-ordinated through the Ardler Village Trust. The Trust has been established to take forward the long term sustainable regeneration of the area including wider regeneration projects.

The Village Trust is run by local people and is tasked with managing and co-ordinating Partnership activity in Ardler, fostering local economic development, promoting social inclusion and monitoring local service delivery in the area.

The regeneration of Ardler was made possible through the provision of New Housing Partnership Programme funding, Housing Association Grant, and Grants for Rent and Owner Occupation totalling around £27 million. Together with additional private sector investment, this has allowed the provision of over 700 new homes for rent and a further 230 for sale.

5 .19 The achievement of new mixed communities will, however, depend on much more than the identification of suitable sites in the development plan. Developers, often in conjunction with RSLs, Communities Scotland and other interested parties, will need to work up proposals for development that meet this aim. As our Planning Advice Note on Affordable Housing (see para 3.33) makes clear, there is some scope for planning authorities to secure a mix of affordable and market housing where supported by identified need.

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