As the High Streets Task Force wraps up after five years, BEN STEPHENSON of BAS Consultancy writes about his experiences delivering support as an expert over 31 centres across the UK. But what have we learned from the programme?
The final assessment report of the High Streets Task Force programme has been released, and I have completed my final expert assignments in Peterborough and Yeovil, so it seems like a good opportunity to reflect on my time supporting the programme over the past half decade. The TLDR version: it's been a ride.
The High Streets Task Force has undoubtedly contributed to our collective, and my personal understanding of what’s happening with places. The programme has also continued to refute the idea that there is an ‘answer’ to places. We know now more than ever that places are complex ecosystems that require tailored approaches.
If some places suffer from similar problems like vacancy, declining footfall or an uninspiring offer, the way to address these always starts with the local.
What else have we learned through the High Streets Task Force? Let's start with the challenges we can take lessons from.
Programme design
The HSTF programme sometimes struggled with its tailoring. This was in part because of the practical need to standardise contract delivery and measurement, and it did as well as it could at striking the balance between the standardised and the bespoke approach. The Institute of Place Management’s existing evidence-base meant we were able to guide places through a series of support pathways across the programme. In practice, this worked well, reflected in high satisfaction scores.
That framework relied heavily on the IPM’s ‘Four R’s of Renewal’ which suggests that there are four key barriers that prevent transformation in places. These are, essentially:
1) A lack of agreed, evidence-based vision to drive the place forward
2) Poor use of the place’s assets for events, markets and activation
3) Negative or neutral perception, reputation and place brand
4) Physical and/or governance structures that are not fit for purpose
The reality for many places that I worked with is that they suffer from a combination of all of these., and it didn't always feel appropriate to choose one. Towns with poor partnerships struggle to agree a vision. They have little chance of delivering the place management needed to turn around negative perceptions or run successful events. Each of these problems exacerbates the others.
It makes some sense to start by focusing on a single issue, however. Often the people that are willing to roll their sleeves up and contribute to improving their places can become overwhelmed with the sheer scale of the task. There are too few of these champions to risk that in places that are struggling, and so we begin with a manageable task.
Finding and communicating with place champions
Finding and working with those champions was a big part of the challenge. Where the programme demanded consistency in the way the Task Force worked with places, in practice this meant working into local authorities as the first point of contact. While it’s difficult to figure out how this could have been avoided in the programme design, it meant a barrier was created between the Task Force and grass roots place champions.
I sometimes saw in Councils a determination to ‘control the message’ or ‘manage expectation’. This could lead to a blurring of the distinction between the legitimate concerns of place champions and the tactics of those that wanted to do the political administration down.
That can in turn lead to a shutting down of communication altogether. Having worked in a local authority many years ago, I understand that reticence, and how much harder it must in the age of social media to field and recover from criticism. Communication is an end in itself however - local people need to feel ownership of the process and the conclusions to be able to support proposals.
So the Task Force relied on the local authority to draw together place champions from the civic, institutional, faith, business and resident communities. This put the council in the role of 'gatekeeper' to the programme, often inadvertently, when in reality we often needed people the council weren’t already working with to contribute. This is by no means the fault of the local authorities we worked with, but something we should use to inform future programme design.
Politics and money
I met many local authority officials that were hardworking and committed advocates for their places, but often they were ground down by the local politics of regeneration and economic development. Budgets were invariably meagre. Some councils were operating under Section 114 Notices, unable to approve any spend over five hundred pounds without a panel of external administrators.
I think it's a mistake to centralise the management of places further. Policy making which shapes localities should really be controlled at the local level. However, change in many places is glacial, and this is frustrating for those that have the energy to go faster, whether inside or outside the Council.
This is where we do need government level support: concerted, joined-up place-first investment and top level 'NPPF-style' framework policymaking, rather than the reverse beauty pageant of the previous Government's Levelling Up programme.
Evaluation
Although the Task Force has been subject to a detailed evaluation, how that learning informs future programmes remains to be seen. All programmes are bound up in the politics of their day, and are ultimately seen as a reflection of the government that launched them. This presumably explains why we haven't seen a continuation of the programme under the new government, much as it's needed.
Additionally though, the High Streets Task Force was being asked to demonstrate potentially indemonstrable outcomes. The change that I saw following my visits to places could not be measured in footfall or spend figures. Success was seeing groups of people realise they had some agency in their place. That they could be trusted to make small incremental changes in newly formed groups. It was seeing Hamlet Court Road setting up 'Hamlet Court Calling' to fundraise for Christmas lights and develop an events progamme. We, and Government, need to accept that place transformation is a slow burn.
Hopeful places
In delivering the programme, I never visited a place that felt beyond hope. There were always people that saw that improving their place was in the collective self-interest, even where they were grappling with systemic problems extending way beyond their town centres. Where those people are trusted to get on and deliver, those places invariable change for the better.
The High Streets Task Force was very good at delivering that message, even where the audience to hear it was small and the power differential between the people in the room was great. If there's ever to be a legacy programme, it should focus on amplifying and cascading the message so that we can identify more place champions and give them the powers they need to lead.
A new localism?
The Labour government is committed to devolution but there is little detail on how those commitments translate to policy, and particularly to community powers. A recasting of existing powers, rights, routes to funding and opportunities for participatory democracy are the next steps to developing places that meet local need.
Without the right framework of powers, the community-building successes of Hastings, Totnes, Frome and Liverpool will always be outliers. Great examples to learn from, but unreachable for too many.
What next
Although no High Streets Task Force II appears to be on the horizon, the pressure to intervene in places that are struggling remains high on the agenda, as the recent Parliamentary Debate led by Caroline Atkinson MP shows. Hopefully the evidence submitted by the IPM and the lessons learned from the Task Force and others moves the debate on a little from last time. Otherwise that intervention becomes little more than fiddling at the edges.
The IPM framework has been influential in my own practice as a placemaker and I am developing a new programme that brings in all the elements of the framework into a single package of support for places. This will provide local champions and council with a clear set of tasks and show them how place systems interlink. It'll be an exciting time bringing this new product to the market and I am keen to work with places that seek a shared, holistic vision and identity, where they feel like they have lost their way over time.
One final thing to say then. We are rapidly improving our understanding of what works in placemaking and the challenge is now less in what we know than it is in how many people know it. People have the desire to bring about place transformation for themselves. The High Streets Task Force framework continues to be one of the the best tools we can use to teach them how.
We should hope for direction from Government soon on support for locally-driven high street renewal, based on learning from the last five years.
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