Hansard

I would like to make some progress.

With the budgets of some regeneration programmes being cut in half, we cannot allow the Scottish National Party Government to get away with blaming Westminster for its decision to prioritise a referendum over regeneration.

With the Ravenscraig project in my area of Lanarkshire already downgraded by this Government in 2008 and £70 million of funding being taken from it at a stroke, it is easy to see the direct correlation between this Government's decisions to reduce support for regeneration and a direct negative impact on areas such as mine.

My constituency of Uddingston and Bellshill is home to some of the country’s largest construction companies and there are more people employed in construction in my area than there are in any other in Scotland, so I recently had a meeting with representatives of construction companies to discuss the current employment situation with them. The picture that they painted of the impending decimation of jobs in that sector is frightening.

It is bad enough to learn that Mr Neil intends to make himself a latter day Dr Beeching with his rail franchise proposals, but it is worse to learn that he is taking a lead from Arnold Schwarzenegger, not in terms of his political leadership, but in his role as “Demolition Man”, when it comes to urban regeneration companies.

I know that times are hard financially, but that is why resources that are available from central Government and local government need to be used smartly to maximise positive outcomes for people and to create virtuous cycles of education, employment, equity, civic pride and community cohesion. That is why our amendment focuses on the creation of jobs, particularly for young people. As we state:

“persistent youth unemployment will have an impact on communities for generations to come.”

There has to be a place for community enterprises, credit unions, co-operatives, housing associations and other community-based organisations in regeneration strategies. The bottom line, however, is that the Government simply cannot choose to slash the housing, regeneration, enterprise and tourism budgets and still claim to have sustainable growth as its purpose, as it is trying to do.

Neighbourhoods frame people’s lives, and provide a bundle of services that people need and an environment on which families depend. They also provide a vital anchor to individual lives, as the cabinet secretary pointed out. That is why our amendment asks Parliament to recognise that the cutting of funding for further education colleges will undermine the important role that colleges play in providing local people with the skills that they need to gain the qualifications that they need for work.

That is why we highlight that the provision of quality social housing is increasingly important as more people in our disadvantaged communities are classified as being fuel poor. Finally, it is why our amendment notes with disappointment that the Scottish Government has chosen to cut the funding to URCs, which will have a negative impact on areas such as Inverclyde, and why we are calling on the Scottish Government to come forward with details about its cities strategy and proposed enterprise areas as soon as possible. We will give those elements our support, because they are vital, but there will have to be constructive dialogue to ensure that we all move together in the same direction.

As I have said previously on this subject, Government must create the space and capacity to assist communities in regeneration of their areas, and the planning framework is central to that.

We know that communities need access to funds to help them regenerate their areas, to bring derelict properties and waste ground into productive use and to promote community engagement while creating local jobs and training opportunities. However, regeneration is not just about paying for new buildings; it must also increase social justice and quality of life by overcoming poverty and disadvantage and by producing more inclusive, equitable and sustainable areas.

Neighbourhoods help to shape people’s lives because they do more than house people. They form a base for wider activities and provide many of the social services that link individuals with one another and give rise to a sense of community.

Many neighbourhoods that are labelled “disadvantaged” are in areas where there have been major and long-term disruptions to the local economy, often through the closure or shrinkage of major employers. Regeneration programmes can claim some success in terms of the physical renewal of public space, the development of commercial properties in some areas and the provision of new and refurbished homes—although not necessarily on the scale and in the forms that are needed.

As was identified in last week’s debate on architecture, people who live in disadvantaged neighbourhoods tend to feel they have very little influence over what happens to their area, and that the interests of those who fund developments often seem to come first. I am therefore delighted that the cabinet secretary has mentioned the importance of involving communities at the outset of regeneration. There must be a continuing emphasis on housing renewal that is dominated not by the interests of developers but by the needs of communities.

There has been an associated lack of attention paid to the cultivation of social capital and community. We have also seen the continuing provision of housing that does not meet the needs and wishes of families, and there has been a tendency, for various reasons, to go for clean-sweep schemes at the cost of restoration and reintegration. That is a disappointment in too many cases. Regeneration initiatives often promise far more than they can deliver, but they will certainly fail to produce the positive results that we all want if the Government rolls back on any commitment on urban regeneration.

If the Parliament does not wish to see any more backsliding on regeneration, I urge members to support Labour’s amendment.

I move amendment S4M-01336.1, to leave out from second “acknowledges” to end and insert:

“considers that central to this will be the creation of jobs, particularly for young people, as persistent youth unemployment will have an impact on communities for generations to come, the important role that colleges play in local areas to provide people with the skills needed to get them the qualifications that they need to work and the provision of quality social housing, which is increasingly important as more people in disadvantaged communities are classified as fuel poor; notes with disappointment that the Scottish Government has chosen to cut the funding to urban regeneration companies and the impact that this will have on areas such as Inverclyde, and calls on the Scottish Government to bring forward details of its Cities Strategy and proposed enterprise areas.”