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CHAPTER EIGHT: PERCEPTIONS OF LOCAL AREAS

Chapter aims

This chapter addresses four key questions:

• What makes an area a good place to live?
• What factors are perceived to be in most need of improvement in local areas?
• How do perceptions of what needs to be improved vary across Scotland?
• Who do people think should be responsible for making improvements to local areas?

Introduction

8.1 Perceptions of quality of life in local areas was asked about in three ways. Firstly, respondents were presented with the following list of thirteen items and were asked to choose three things that they thought make an area a good place to live:

• Low level of crime
• Access to GPs and local health services
• Good quality affordable housing
• Good shopping facilities
• Access to good public transport
• Good schools
• Good jobs
• Facilities for young children
• Strong sense of community spirit
• Clean local environment
• Public spaces in good condition (e.g. pavements, parks, roads)
• Family and friends close by
• Access to places to go out (e.g. pubs, restaurants, galleries)

8.2 They were then asked which one of these elements was most in need of improvement where they lived ( see table 28 in Annex 3 for full details of the question format). Finally they were asked who they thought should be responsible for making such improvements. The options presented were:

• People who live in the area
• Local council
• Scottish Parliament
• Scottish Executive
• UK Government
• Local health board
• The police
• Local businesses
• Other

What makes an area a good place to live?

8.3 As Table 8.1 shows, views about what makes an area a good place to live were quite evenly distributed. The table shows the responses people gave when asked for their first choice as well as the results of their first and second choices combined. This latter measure gives an indication of how people prioritised certain items. For example, one in four (25%) opted for a low level of crime as their first choice, however over four in ten (42%) mentioned this as either their first or second choice.

Table 8.1 Perceptions of what makes an area a good place to live

Note to table

The results are presented in descending order of the first and second choices combined, not in the order presented to respondents in the survey.

8.4 Table 8.2 looks at five of the more commonly selected factors presented in Table 8.1, ¹⁴ and contrasts the views of different people according to four key factors: age, hardship, rurality, and area deprivation (as measured by the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation, see Annex 2 for further information). These factors were chosen to reflect a mixture of both individual and area level aspects that might be related to people's views. Perceptions of what makes an area a good place to live might, in part, be related to issues associated with their own individual experiences but could also be dependent on the kind of community or area in which they live. Though it is likely that the balance between individual and area level determinants of people's perceptions will vary depending on the aspect in question. For example, older people were much more likely to say that access to GPs and health services is important than young people, while people in remote rural areas were more likely to say this than people in large urban areas. The former is likely to be because older people make greater use of health services than young people, whereas the relationship between rurality and views about access to health services is likely to reflect concerns about the availability of local health services in rural areas (see Farmer et al (2004)).

8.5 Younger people were more likely to say that good quality affordable housing was important than older people; people living in large urban areas were more likely to say this than those in rural areas. The fact that people tend to enter the housing market when they are younger, and that prices are on the whole higher (though not exclusively) in Scotland's cities, are likely explanations of why this might be ¹⁵.

Table 8.2 Perceptions of what makes an area a good place to live (first and second choice combined), by age, self-rated hardship, urban / rural residence and SIMD quintiles

8.6 Table 8.2 highlights some interesting differences between the perceptions of different groups, however, there are also some notable points of consensus. For example, the belief that good quality affordable housing is important was just as likely to be chosen by people living comfortably on their income as by people having difficulty. People in the most and least deprived communities also had very similar views about what makes an area a good place to live. It is also interesting to note that the difference between the proportions in the most and least deprived who said a low level of crime is important was only four percentage points. As the next section illustrates, the prevalence of concern about the level of crime was quite different in both communities.

What is most in need of improvement in local areas?

8.7 Having established the kinds of attributes people thought important for a local area Table 8.3 illustrates what people thought was most in need of improvement in their own area. A low level of crime was generally considered the most important quality for an area to have, however when it came to what most needed to improve two other factors were more commonly cited: facilities for young children and the amount of good quality affordable housing. Surveys often show that for many people fear of crime is often greater than people's own experience of victimisation (Zedner, 1997), so the fact that fewer people said the crime rate in their area needed improvement (11%) than said a low level of crime was important for an area (25%) possibly reflects this phenomenon. In contrast, similar proportions said good quality affordable housing makes an area a good place to live (13%) and that this aspect was in need of improvement (15%). The differences between the responses in Tables 8.1 and 8.3 will also in part reflect the fact that Table 8.1 covered slightly more generalised concepts, about which a greater level of consensus might be expected, whereas Table 8.3 looks at specific aspects about individual areas or neighbourhoods.

8.8 As was the case in Table 8.1, there was quite a spread of views about what most needed improvement. This diversity is most likely to reflect the fact that the list of possible options presented was itself quite wide ranging. But it is also unsurprising that a survey covering many different communities across Scotland (and the many different individuals within them) would attract very different views on a matter like this. How views varied between different groups in society is explored in more detail below.

Table 8.3 Perceptions of what is most in need of improvement

Note to table
The results are presented in descending order of responses given, not in the order presented to respondents in the survey.

8.9 Table 8.4 follows a similar format to Table 8.2. It presents a selection of some of the more commonly chosen factors as well as some which were less common but nevertheless interesting when the views of different groups were explored. On balance, the views of people living in different types of community (urban or rural, least and most deprived) vary to a greater extent overall than the views between different age groups and hardship levels. For example, the largest percentage point differences between any of the groups are in relation to perceptions of crime in the least and most deprived areas (21 points) and in perceptions of the availability of good quality affordable housing between large urban and remote rural areas (also 21 points). This latter point is particularly interesting - when asked what makes an area a good place to live, people in remote rural areas were less likely to pick affordable housing than people in urban areas, but here the reverse is true when it comes to perceptions of what is in need of improvement. This confirms the complexity of relationship between what people think of in general terms about what makes an area a good place to live, and their concerns about specific local issues.

Table 8.4 Perceptions of what is most in need of improvement, by age, self-rated hardship, urban / rural residence and SIMD quintiles

Responsibility for improvements to local areas

8.10 The improvement of local communities - and by extension the quality of life of the individuals within them - is at the heart of many of the Scottish Executive's policies. But do the public see this as a primary responsibility for this level of government? Or do they not consider this to be the responsibility of governments at all, favouring instead action by individuals, business or other public bodies? The evidence presented in Table 8.5 suggests that while a majority of people attributed responsibility to a level of government, people were more likely to choose local councils than either the Scottish Parliament, Scottish Executive or the UK Government at Westminster. A minority (10%) chose local people while the same proportion picked either Health Boards, the police or local businesses.

8.5 Who should be responsible for making improvements to the local area?

Note to table

Some of the answer options in this table have been combined. See table 30 in Annex 3 for full details of the responses given.

8.11 It is not particularly meaningful to look at the figures in Table 8.5 in any great detail in isolation because some of the kinds of improvement cited as necessary were, of course, beyond the scope of some of the bodies (for example the police can do little about the availability of affordable housing in an area). Table 8.6 therefore presents the results in the format of a matrix. It takes a selection of seven aspects thought to be in need of improvement and for each one shows the two bodies people most commonly thought should be responsible for improving matters. So, reading across the table from left to right it is possible to see from the first row that the police were most commonly thought of as the body who should be responsible for improving the level of crime (44% said this), followed by the local council (23% said this) ¹⁶.

8.12 It is interesting to note that the Scottish Executive or Scottish Parliament was chosen only once as the body with greatest responsibility for an area (improving the quality of jobs). But it is clear from the other choices people made about responsibility that the responses people gave were highly dependent on the issue which they felt needed improvement in the first place. For example, the police were mentioned in relation to crime levels, Health Boards in relation to access to medical services, and the council in relation to transport. Most people appear to have focussed most of their attention on the bodies charged with the delivery of services. Slightly fewer took a broader view and chose bodies which could be said to have more over-arching strategic responsibilities, such as councils in relation to crime, or the Scottish Executive or Parliament in relation to health services.

8.6 Perceptions of aspects in need of improvement and who should be responsible for making improvements

Note to table

The sample sizes on which this table is based are: level of crime 179, access to GPs 107, affordable housing 246, facilities for children 256, quality of jobs 182, access to public transport 121, sense of community spirit 83.

Key points from this chapter

• When asked what makes an area a good place to live the top three answers given were a low level of crime (25%), strong community spirit (17%) and good quality affordable housing (13%). Four in ten (42%) mentioned low crime as either their first or second choice.
• People's perceptions of local area qualities were in part dependent on their individual circumstances. For example, older people (26%) were more likely to mention access to GPs and health services than younger people (7%).
• The kinds of areas people live in also makes a difference. People in large urban areas were more likely to pick good quality affordable housing than people in rural areas.
• When asked what was in need of improvement in their local area the top three choices were facilities for young children (16%), the amount of good quality affordable housing (15%) and the level of crime (11%).
• People's views about their own areas were more strongly related to the kinds of area they themselves lived in than to their own individual characteristics.
• For example, people living in the most deprived areas were more likely to say the level of crime needed to be improved than people in less deprived places (26% and 5% respectively).
• Local councils were most commonly chosen as the body with responsibility for making changes to a local area. 83% of people who said their area needed better facilities for young children said the council should do this.
• When asked who should be responsible for improving the aspect they had said was most in need of improvement people tended to pick bodies with primary service delivery functions, such as the Health Board for GP services, the police for crime rates and the council for services for children.

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