Poor Neighbourhoods and Poor Services: Evidence on the ‘Rationing’ of Environmental Service Provision to Deprived Neighbourhoods

There is growing political concern that poor neighbourhoods often receive inadequate public services, although little research to date which explores how and why this may be the case. Earlier research on environmental services has suggested that poor neighbourhoods do not tend to get levels of this service which are proportionate to their needs. This paper extends an earlier analysis to explore the processes by which this underprovision occurs. It is argued that three ‘rationing’ processes are central to explanations: institutional rationing which describes a systemic bias against fully meeting the needs of poor neighbourhoods; reactive rationing in which service practices and standards are varied between neighbourhoods; and political rationing where service levels and standards are sensitive to variations in the political resources of neighbourhoods. The analysis reveals how these rationing processes produce levels of environmental maintenance in poor neighbourhoods which are insufficient to address needs.