Questions for the council: what happened to democracy?

The regeneration has been consistently characterised by a democratic deficit since its very early stages in 2019 and 2020, when residents witnessed a general breakdown of democratic representation and BCC’s failure to fulfil its duty consult ahead of the bidding process

• Breakdown of democratic representation

In June 2019, Ladywood councillors issued a first leaflet pledging their commitment to help residents lead the regeneration process and inviting residents to join a Steering Group for that purpose. In August 2019, the councillors promised that a meeting would be held in early autumn that year. In October, councillors reiterated their commitment to support a Steering Group and urged residents to wait for the Council to appoint a person “to work for and together with” them and “proper engagement in developing the plans”.

In December 2019, councillors stated that a role description for the for the Central Ladywood Regeneration (CLR) community organiser had been drafted and that councillors “will make sure that the person appointed knows what we expect of him/her”. The letter ended with a request to wait: “please be patient. It’ll be worth at the end”. The promise of a community organiser was reiterated in the 2019 Christmas newsletter.

It is important to acknowledge the impacts that the COVID-19 pandemic that followed might have had on these plans. At the same time, the fast-paced readjustment of institutional and work life during 2020 gave tools and knowledge that would have enabled timely engagement with residents.

Meanwhile, even though engagement with residents broke down, BCC engaged with prospective bidders in the social dialogue phase of the bidding process throughout 2020.

• Failure to fulfil the duty to consult prior to the bidding process

Residents were not involved in the long-listing and shortlisting of potential options for the development of the Ladywood Estate (2023 Full Business Case. Appendix 2: C1) prior to commencing a bidding process.

A commitment to engage and consult residents at the early stages is a provision in the National Planning Framework. BCC has not followed best practices in this regard.

Moreover, and more importantly, according to the 2015 Best Value Statutory Guidance, “authorities should work with voluntary and community groups and small businesses when facing difficult funding decisions”. As the guidance also states:

“this is not optional. Authorities must consult representatives of council tax payers, those who use or are likely to use services provided by the authority, and those appearing to the authority to have an interest in any area within which the authority carries out functions. Authorities should include local voluntary and community organisations and small businesses in such consultation”

This provision is also supported by the Section 3(2) of the Local Government Act 1999, according to which:

“an authority must consult— (a) representatives of persons liable to pay any tax, precept or levy to or in respect of the authority, (b) representatives of persons liable to pay non-domestic rates in respect of any area within which the authority carries out functions, (c) representatives of persons who use or are likely to use services provided by the authority, and (d) representatives of persons appearing to the authority to have an interest in any area within which the authority carries out functions”

The February 2019 Cabinet Report mentions that local residents’ representative had been “consulted through a forum established by local ward members” ahead of the completion of the said report. “The residents forum have met at 2 separate consultation events which discussed the current issues affecting the area and how estate regeneration could deal with these”. Also, an additional meeting was planned to be held on February 19 2019 “when senior officers from the Inclusive Growth Directorate will be present and will discuss with local residents the regeneration proposals” (5-6)

Despite the requests for further information by residents organisation, Ladywood Unite, there is a lack of evidence in the public domain on when these meetings occurred, who was invited to be part of these consultations and why, how many attended these meetings, and whether these meetings were just informative sessions or, alternatively focused workshops that enabled participants to significantly influence the visioning of the scheme. The lack of evidence questions the transparency, sincerity and efficacy of these early consultation attempts.

If these meetings were carried out, 2-3 consultation events are not sufficient proof of that the BCC fulfilled its duty to consult as stated by the 2015 Best Value Statutory Guidance and the Local Government Act 1999.