Abstract
Neighbourhood planning is the generic process by which community groups engage with the planning system at the most local level in order to influence higher-level decision-making. Having started primarily in rural areas, recent legislative and policy changes in England have advocated a transfer of the democratic role of parish councils to urban areas. As is common with much urban policy, successive governments of different colours have sought to steer policy towards particular ideological positions in order to reflect different interpretations of ‘local democracy’. Thus while parish councils have a long legal pedigree and stem largely from the Local Government Act 1894, they were originally intended as a form of specifically rural governance. Recent Acts in 1997 and 2007 extended to urban areas the powers to form parish councils, although they had no statutory planning powers and the take-up was limited. It was the Localism Act of 2011 which opened up a new alternative and which enabled local communities to form neighbourhood forums and to prepare neighbourhood development plans.
While the legislation provides a very basic description of the powers to be devolved to parish councils and neighbourhood forums, much is left to local determination and a process of negotiation and compromise. Thus the basic dimensions of size, population, resources and formal links to higher tiers of government vary enormously in different locations. For those interested in governance and the workings of the planning system, this opens up a rich field of research. How far do these measures promote genuine devolution to the grassroots and do they enhance processes of local democracy? How much influence should local communities have over planning decisions which directly affect them? And to what extent are local authorities willing to transfer powers and take account of lower-level tiers of democracy?
This book is one of the first to address these questions and is a major contribution to the field. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, Gallent and Robinson systematically review the evolving field of legislation and policy with four main aims. The first is to investigate the community groups themselves to find out how they “form networks of shared interest” (p. 4). Who gets involved and how does the leadership ‘emerge’? The second aim is to explore the linkages between local groups and the planning authorities and service providers. Are the contacts direct or indirect and how is neighbourhood planning used by the ‘professionals’ in the higher-tier authorities? The third aim is to examine whether a new synthesis can be achieved between local aspirations and formalised, statutory systems. The final aim is to reflect on the “critical interface between communities and policy actors” (p. 6). Is there any evidence that a single, coherent and interconnected planning process arises from these disparate systems of governance and local management?
The case study chosen is Ashford in Kent (South East England), which in 2001 had a population just over 100 000 and was sub-divided into 39 parishes. Partly because of its strategic location on the Channel Tunnel rail link, it had been identified as a growth area and in 2009 it was required to accommodate 22 700 additional dwellings by 2026. Inevitably, different parishes were affected in different ways; some were required to accommodate large amounts of growth, whilst others took a defensive stance in preparation for rapid expansion on their borders. The book systematically records the processes by which different parishes responded to external pressures, developed internal capacity, made contact with policy actors, and connected with service providers through a variety of planning procedures.
A particular feature of the book is the way it weaves in theoretical discussion of key concepts with the empirical evidence from the 10 parishes which are selected for detailed study. The starting point is the theory of collaborative planning (Healey, 1997) out of which grows a discussion of social capital and network power (Booher and Innes, 2002). Power is relational in that it is constituted in networks of affiliation and power can be exerted by the sharing of skills and knowledge. Chapter 7 draws out the empirical findings. Most groups depended on a small number of activists who tended to be middle-class and retired or semi-retired. It was often difficult to get people to attend meetings or to devote much time to parish affairs as opposed to social or voluntary activities. Communications often became introverted and exclusive to a small clique who presented ‘demands’ which higher-tier organisations found difficult to integrate into more professionally orientated procedures. Alliances between parishes, or between parishes and other agencies, were often short-lived and transitory. Parish clerks had an important role to play and would often suggest new approaches, such as village plans. The South Ashford Parish Partnership, for instance, was formed between 12 parishes in the area subject to the growth strategy. Yet this was relatively short-lived once the new growth had been integrated into the Local Development Framework.
Chapter 12 provides some fascinating insights into how community planning activity in the parishes is viewed by the district council planners. Few parishes believed that their planning work had influenced the borough council’s policies. Gallent and Robinson found that the planners were generally unwilling to make much use of the neighbourhood planning in their areas. It was useful background information in that it indicated how parish council élites were thinking, but had only a limited impact on the control of development and wider planning process. Parish councils, on the other hand, felt marginalised. As a parish council member concluded [Whether] anyone has looked at the [parish plan] is a complete mystery to me. I think that it’s landed on the desk, they’ve ticked the box, “oh, yes, they’ve done one”. … I would have thought, having done a document like that, or any document from a parish since they instigate it, that we get some come-back and say, “ok, you’ve done that now can we have a talk about this and go through and make sure we understand the views”, but … nothing. It just went into a black hole (interview, p. 155).
The book is full of rich insights into how planning operates at these levels and should be commended for blending both the theoretical literature and the empirical evidence in a very accessible style. There is much here which could inform the Coalition government’s commitment to ‘localism’ and its desire to encourage communities to become either parish councils or neighbourhood forums, which then have the option to prepare neighbourhood development plans for themselves. This will not be a straightforward process and, as the authors suggest, this trend towards localism and ‘empowerment’ “can bring as much conflict as it does contentment” (p. 191). This book should be required reading for all those in central and local government who have an interest in promoting local democracy and ensuring that local communities are fully engaged in a more devolved planning system.