Built Environment Committee
Tuesday 3rd November 2026
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10:36
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
And welcome to the Built Environment Committee and to the first evidence session of our Inquiry on Maintenance and Enforcement in Public Spaces. Joining us today are very pleased to see three very eminent practitioners, Patricia Brown, director of central. David Millner, managing director of Crate Streets. And Ed Lennox, who is the director of operations at Clean Up Britain. Quite a spread of expertise and commitment there. We've got a lot to get through this morning, as always. So I'm going to ask committee and witnesses to keep questions and answers short and sharp. And we're aware that David has to leave us for another select committee.
They come along like buses, clearly actually. So we will have to release you early. Don't feel that each of you has to answer every question. If there's one of you that has a particular expertise and experience, please make that choice. I want to say, before I ask you to introduce yourself, that I wanted to put two fundamental questions, which are contextual questions, before I put my first formal question to you. And the one is, just to be clear, whether what would your definition, from your experience, be of the public realm and a public space and whether they would be the same or different?
So maybe you could address that question when you introduce yourselves. The second question is even more fundamental, actually, which is what is the exam question that this committee should really be addressing with the hope of getting a very effective and concise and practical answer? And I would ask you to think about that in the course of the morning, because I think that's best come back to at the end when we are thinking about the other gaps we might address and issues might arise. So those are the two questions. But in the meantime, can I just ask you to introduce yourselves very briefly and set out your interests and expertise?
Lies. Can I start actually with David?
They come along like buses, clearly actually. So we will have to release you early. Don't feel that each of you has to answer every question. If there's one of you that has a particular expertise and experience, please make that choice. I want to say, before I ask you to introduce yourself, that I wanted to put two fundamental questions, which are contextual questions, before I put my first formal question to you. And the one is, just to be clear, whether what would your definition, from your experience, be of the public realm and a public space and whether they would be the same or different?
So maybe you could address that question when you introduce yourselves. The second question is even more fundamental, actually, which is what is the exam question that this committee should really be addressing with the hope of getting a very effective and concise and practical answer? And I would ask you to think about that in the course of the morning, because I think that's best come back to at the end when we are thinking about the other gaps we might address and issues might arise. So those are the two questions. But in the meantime, can I just ask you to introduce yourselves very briefly and set out your interests and expertise?
Lies. Can I start actually with David?
10:38
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Morning, everyone. So David Millner, managing director of Crate Streets, we're an urban design consultancy, a town builder and a think tank. So we're a little bit weird, a little bit unusual. We essentially do projects as an urban design practice. So we do street design. We write lots of street design manuals for councils up and down the country like Surrey, Cheshire, Lincolnshire and currently Oxfordshire. We also then take those learnings and put them into policy practice. So if we find out that it's really difficult to plant trees in sort of 3 or 4 areas will work out what the policy levers are, which is leading to this.
And then ditto. We've done the same with transport. We're doing lots of work on trams as well. At the moment. I'm a member of the Mass Transit Task Force, looking at how we make this cheaper and quicker to, to get our kind of second cities going and personally very interested, obviously, in decarbonising transport and cities. And then in terms of personal life, I've been doing this for seven years with a passion, as I said, for making cities more prosperous, more sustainable, and then previously was in the Air Force for about seven years. So very different career change.
And then ditto. We've done the same with transport. We're doing lots of work on trams as well. At the moment. I'm a member of the Mass Transit Task Force, looking at how we make this cheaper and quicker to, to get our kind of second cities going and personally very interested, obviously, in decarbonising transport and cities. And then in terms of personal life, I've been doing this for seven years with a passion, as I said, for making cities more prosperous, more sustainable, and then previously was in the Air Force for about seven years. So very different career change.
10:39
10:40
10:40
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Yeah, I think so. Yeah. So looking at how to get a lot of forgotten cities to use placemaking to use street design to support their economic revival, whether that's making it a more attractive place for businesses to locate because it's a fun, interesting, beautiful environment for their workforce to come to, I think would be one of our key planks. But then also we do a lot of work on how to densify. So we use the phrase gentle density, which essentially more homes on less land to solve the housing crisis in theory, and help more people get to more jobs more quickly.
10:40
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Thank you very much. And it's wonderful to be here. And thank you for for choosing this subject. I'm going to pick up on that sort of the starting point, the last point that David made, and you questioned him about growth and go back in time to the late 90s when I was running something called Central London Partnership that brought together the public and the private sector to improve London. And it was a very new, very nascent approach to working collectively to do things , to make sure that London would prosper and, and improve in lots of ways.
And I was fresh out of the the, the first inward investment agency for London and thinking very much about competitive cities and what we wanted to do, amongst many other things that we tackled, including social equity, social cohesion, as we called it at the time. It was actually think about how we made the public realm, the built environment, as we called it then, because place wasn't even talked about to, to be the stage for people choosing to live, work and invest there. So people would live their lives in London and central London, people would invest in central London, visit and choose to spend their leisure time and, crucially, their money.
So it was about the future economic prospects of London and remaining a world city. So we went on to do a huge amount, led particularly by the interest of the business community, wanting to be stewards of London and put their money and investment into being active. Stuarts in improving London. We established the Business Improvement District movement into the UK did an awful lot, which I can talk about later, around creating walking as a form of transport as opposed to just just I don't mean just a leisure activity, but using that in terms of mode shift and, and creating the very first thinking around the idea of, you know, a better environmental condition in London by getting rid of cars, not getting rid of cars, but helping cars find their place.
So we lobbied for the Trafalgar Square pedestrianisation, for example, and, and I now run my own consultancy. And a lot of the work I do is strategic advice. But at the heart of it is marshalling the right thinking and the right people to make positive change right across the country. And I've worked in New York as well, so thank you.
And I was fresh out of the the, the first inward investment agency for London and thinking very much about competitive cities and what we wanted to do, amongst many other things that we tackled, including social equity, social cohesion, as we called it at the time. It was actually think about how we made the public realm, the built environment, as we called it then, because place wasn't even talked about to, to be the stage for people choosing to live, work and invest there. So people would live their lives in London and central London, people would invest in central London, visit and choose to spend their leisure time and, crucially, their money.
So it was about the future economic prospects of London and remaining a world city. So we went on to do a huge amount, led particularly by the interest of the business community, wanting to be stewards of London and put their money and investment into being active. Stuarts in improving London. We established the Business Improvement District movement into the UK did an awful lot, which I can talk about later, around creating walking as a form of transport as opposed to just just I don't mean just a leisure activity, but using that in terms of mode shift and, and creating the very first thinking around the idea of, you know, a better environmental condition in London by getting rid of cars, not getting rid of cars, but helping cars find their place.
So we lobbied for the Trafalgar Square pedestrianisation, for example, and, and I now run my own consultancy. And a lot of the work I do is strategic advice. But at the heart of it is marshalling the right thinking and the right people to make positive change right across the country. And I've worked in New York as well, so thank you.
10:43
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
Good morning everybody. Lennox, operations director, clean up Britain, clean Up Britain is the only organisation in the UK focused on littering and fly tipping. That's our sort of root. But it goes wider than that because the broken window syndrome is very much in play in the UK at the moment, and nothing helps you see this more clearly than if you travel through Europe and then arrive back in Dover and and come up the aid to M2, at which point by the time you've gone about three quarters of a mile, you want to start self-harming. It's so appalling and embarrassing.
So whilst we have our roots in littering and fly tipping this. There's a there's a danger for us in scope creep, because when you start looking into the issues that surround that, you find that the related issues of lack of maintenance, lack of care, and the appalling slide in standards that we are allowing to surround us , and we're becoming immune to seeing falling down signs, signs that you can't read, foliage over, growing weeds, growing out of the pavements and such like. And that's led us really into quite a deep analysis of how dysfunctional the state is.
And I don't mean this in a sort of in a I don't want to be pejorative, but it's the way in which tax money is spent to create structures and layers and layers of bureaucracy and legislative opacity between who's responsible for what is. In the end, if you wanted to design a system that was not going to deliver a well maintained public realm, we have it. And the danger, and I'd like to make this clear, is that when you actually start to realise what the problem is, there is a danger that people perceive that you've got some appalling political agenda, which we have none.
We just want to see the job done. And in too many cases, the job is not being done. And in too many cases, the money that is spent to do the job is being spent and allocated by people who simply have no understanding, no experience or ability to rationally determine whether that is value for money or not. So Clean Up Britain specialise in shining a light on what the problems are, and we do have some very high level recommendations. But in the end there is no connection like there used to be, certainly 50 years ago, between a local problem, a named local individual who had pride in their work, delivering good value for money to get that problem fixed.
And if we can go some way to getting back to that level where accountability and responsibility are vested in local people with fewer layers of bureaucracy, and also at the, at the at the sort of governmental scale. There are too many agencies involved in this.
So whilst we have our roots in littering and fly tipping this. There's a there's a danger for us in scope creep, because when you start looking into the issues that surround that, you find that the related issues of lack of maintenance, lack of care, and the appalling slide in standards that we are allowing to surround us , and we're becoming immune to seeing falling down signs, signs that you can't read, foliage over, growing weeds, growing out of the pavements and such like. And that's led us really into quite a deep analysis of how dysfunctional the state is.
And I don't mean this in a sort of in a I don't want to be pejorative, but it's the way in which tax money is spent to create structures and layers and layers of bureaucracy and legislative opacity between who's responsible for what is. In the end, if you wanted to design a system that was not going to deliver a well maintained public realm, we have it. And the danger, and I'd like to make this clear, is that when you actually start to realise what the problem is, there is a danger that people perceive that you've got some appalling political agenda, which we have none.
We just want to see the job done. And in too many cases, the job is not being done. And in too many cases, the money that is spent to do the job is being spent and allocated by people who simply have no understanding, no experience or ability to rationally determine whether that is value for money or not. So Clean Up Britain specialise in shining a light on what the problems are, and we do have some very high level recommendations. But in the end there is no connection like there used to be, certainly 50 years ago, between a local problem, a named local individual who had pride in their work, delivering good value for money to get that problem fixed.
And if we can go some way to getting back to that level where accountability and responsibility are vested in local people with fewer layers of bureaucracy, and also at the, at the at the sort of governmental scale. There are too many agencies involved in this.
10:46
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
And I stop you there because I think what you're telling us is absolutely fundamental to what we need to know. But you'll have an opportunity, I think, to develop those arguments as we ask the questions. And then you can certainly because what you've done already actually is partly answer my first question, which is, you know, how would you describe the current state of UK public spaces, bearing in mind that we have already enough information provided to the committee to understand the lack of evidence, the impartial, unequal, fragmentary nature of evidence, inconclusive nature of evidence, which makes it difficult to say something is definitely worse.
And yet people seem to think that things are definitely worse. So are they definitely worse? How do we know? And what would you say currently is the state? Are we right to be concerned? Can I start actually with again, with David, because I'm very anxious that we don't miss out. Anything that you have to say before you leave?
And yet people seem to think that things are definitely worse. So are they definitely worse? How do we know? And what would you say currently is the state? Are we right to be concerned? Can I start actually with again, with David, because I'm very anxious that we don't miss out. Anything that you have to say before you leave?
10:47
10:47
10:47
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Say that beyond potholes? So I was looking at everything beyond apart from potholes. So potholes are the sort of galvanizing topic which everyone is trying to win. Votes will go, will point to. So we thought we'd ask, okay, what's number two, three, four and five on on this list and how far away are they? So we did some polling with Deltapoll and 14% of people ranked potholes as number one. So overwhelmingly the lead from a list of about 12 things. But number two, at 11.1% was pavement quality. And then we did lots of other questions around cleanliness, graffiti.
All these topics are really not that far behind, but they're sort of clouded maybe by this this one perfectly relevant, important topic. But we need to focus on the other parts. And in a way, it's that sense that the visual clutter nature, I would sort of wrap it all up into pavements, bins, rubbish bags, we call them street scars. When you sort of see a beautiful yorkstone or granite pavement, and then it's got asphalt sort of scars going across from where you've sort of come to dig it up and then left it for six months in theory, but maybe even longer.
All of these things we don't see as often when we're going to France, Germany and other countries.
All these topics are really not that far behind, but they're sort of clouded maybe by this this one perfectly relevant, important topic. But we need to focus on the other parts. And in a way, it's that sense that the visual clutter nature, I would sort of wrap it all up into pavements, bins, rubbish bags, we call them street scars. When you sort of see a beautiful yorkstone or granite pavement, and then it's got asphalt sort of scars going across from where you've sort of come to dig it up and then left it for six months in theory, but maybe even longer.
All of these things we don't see as often when we're going to France, Germany and other countries.
10:49
10:49
10:49
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
Maybe in fact, some of that actually. Yeah. But what you're saying is that from your perspective, what really matters and really affects people is the ordinary clutter, which they live with on a daily basis, which is dirt and street furniture and in the wrong place and graffiti and, and safe pavements and the general quality of negotiating the normal town centres. Right.
10:49
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Yeah, exactly. I think it's you could have you could spend a lot of money on the shopfronts and have done this, you know, incredible piece of regeneration, maybe even put in the pavements. But if you've because we don't seem to have this sort of as Ed's point, this one owner or one person who's accountable in our high streets, you might then just have a bunch of bin bags on there. They're leaking out, damaging the stones permanently, or you've got a phone box in the middle of where everyone wants to be walking, and it doesn't work, and it's graffitied and rubbish.
It's there as well. And it's that sort of sense of we call it everyday competence within that town.
It's there as well. And it's that sort of sense of we call it everyday competence within that town.
10:50
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Well, can I go back to one of your questions, which is the definition of public space, which is because I want to ask you that was thinking about the sense of, you know, where the whole of the realm that is not in the in a private space, whether that's our home or a school or inside, you know, a commercial building where we congregate and, and interact and live our lives and walk to places. I think of that as our public realm, public space and, and that, you know, that also goes to things like playgrounds. And, you know, so wherever we, we spend can spend time and need to be in order to go about our daily business.
And that is roads as well as, as, and as well as the actual what lots of people think as public space, which is a little bit of a pocket park or a little bit of a, of a, you know, a pavement area that has been designed and thought about. So everything is really part of it. And, and I, I think, I think deeply about this. I've, I've created an initiative called London 3.0 because what I imagined, what I witnessed and actually worked on was the improvement of public space and getting that concerted management, whether that's through business improvement districts or other measures to have that, that ownership of, of the public realm, to think about the details and to worry about the details and to enforce the things that need enforcing.
And I think several things happened. We went I think it was going up the Maslow's hierarchy of place, and we really did incredibly well. And then place actualization. And then along came austerity and, and budgets were cut dramatically and attention turned away to those small things that add talked about and, and also a whole range of things like the way we run waste services, which I'm sure we, Ed, you know, is expert in it is bonkers that we have a system where people take their rubbish and put it on the streets, and that rubbish could be full of coffee grinds and grease.
And we we expect people to negotiate their daily lives around bin bags, which are leaking rubbish and toxic fumes in some cases, and in in onto our public realm. And then we expect the Highways Authority or the local authority to pay to clean them. And so we need a fundamental rethink and fresh look. And the reason I call this London 3.0 is because we, we, we made all these changes and we went up and now we're going down. So in the face of many changes, including urban innovation, like hire bikes and, you know, dockless bikes, and we'll have delivery.
The little delivery drone things that are delivering to people in some parts and, and a whole series of things which is taking space. And actually the private sector is monetizing our public space. We, local authorities and business improvement districts are trying to keep up with that. And and then there's a cultural aspect as well, which is you need to want to care about these places, and you need to have ownership and a sense of care. And I think so much of this comes down to having people who don't sweat the small stuff in our built environment.
And I think it's really important to focus on the details and to actually have a management structure and a funding structure that allows people to be on the streets to enforce these things. And, and amongst that and cultural change in the public, I call so much of that has gone wrong since the noughties as what I call the leave behind, the takeaway leave behind culture. If you go to Venice, where there is only one McDonald's, you do not see a Cafe Nero cop and somebody cigarette packet sat on somebody else's window ledge. Why have we created a culture that enables the public to think it's okay to take something away and leave it behind?
I've got more to say, but I'm going.
And that is roads as well as, as, and as well as the actual what lots of people think as public space, which is a little bit of a pocket park or a little bit of a, of a, you know, a pavement area that has been designed and thought about. So everything is really part of it. And, and I, I think, I think deeply about this. I've, I've created an initiative called London 3.0 because what I imagined, what I witnessed and actually worked on was the improvement of public space and getting that concerted management, whether that's through business improvement districts or other measures to have that, that ownership of, of the public realm, to think about the details and to worry about the details and to enforce the things that need enforcing.
And I think several things happened. We went I think it was going up the Maslow's hierarchy of place, and we really did incredibly well. And then place actualization. And then along came austerity and, and budgets were cut dramatically and attention turned away to those small things that add talked about and, and also a whole range of things like the way we run waste services, which I'm sure we, Ed, you know, is expert in it is bonkers that we have a system where people take their rubbish and put it on the streets, and that rubbish could be full of coffee grinds and grease.
And we we expect people to negotiate their daily lives around bin bags, which are leaking rubbish and toxic fumes in some cases, and in in onto our public realm. And then we expect the Highways Authority or the local authority to pay to clean them. And so we need a fundamental rethink and fresh look. And the reason I call this London 3.0 is because we, we, we made all these changes and we went up and now we're going down. So in the face of many changes, including urban innovation, like hire bikes and, you know, dockless bikes, and we'll have delivery.
The little delivery drone things that are delivering to people in some parts and, and a whole series of things which is taking space. And actually the private sector is monetizing our public space. We, local authorities and business improvement districts are trying to keep up with that. And and then there's a cultural aspect as well, which is you need to want to care about these places, and you need to have ownership and a sense of care. And I think so much of this comes down to having people who don't sweat the small stuff in our built environment.
And I think it's really important to focus on the details and to actually have a management structure and a funding structure that allows people to be on the streets to enforce these things. And, and amongst that and cultural change in the public, I call so much of that has gone wrong since the noughties as what I call the leave behind, the takeaway leave behind culture. If you go to Venice, where there is only one McDonald's, you do not see a Cafe Nero cop and somebody cigarette packet sat on somebody else's window ledge. Why have we created a culture that enables the public to think it's okay to take something away and leave it behind?
I've got more to say, but I'm going.
10:55
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
To leave it there. Thank. These are very, very interesting questions indeed. And they are very profound questions actually about behaviour and difference in cultures and so on. And whether we get to the bottom of that may be beyond the scope of this committee. But thank you for giving us that start. Ed.
10:55
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
The built environment, the public realm has deteriorated in the opinions of 77% of people. I'm not going to start referring to notes here. I can furnish them later. All the research shows that the perception is that the public realm is disintegrating in front of our very eyes. In fact, there's evidence even across Lambeth Bridge. If any of you want to go and look at it, I dare say there are different agencies responsible for different parts of that bridge. If you walk along the river, the road side of it, rather than swim underneath it, the road side is quite well painted.
If you look at the side of it and underneath it, I almost guarantee you just by looking at it, that has not had any maintenance done on it. From the river side, from the under side for at least 15 years, it's faded, there's rust showing we've completely lost our ability to live by the old adage, a stitch in nine saves time makes me sound incredibly old. But it's true. Preservation is better than cure. We've lost that. What you said, Patricia, just now was we seem to have. I can't remember the exact words. Forgive me, but somebody will have a record we.
If you look at the side of it and underneath it, I almost guarantee you just by looking at it, that has not had any maintenance done on it. From the river side, from the under side for at least 15 years, it's faded, there's rust showing we've completely lost our ability to live by the old adage, a stitch in nine saves time makes me sound incredibly old. But it's true. Preservation is better than cure. We've lost that. What you said, Patricia, just now was we seem to have. I can't remember the exact words. Forgive me, but somebody will have a record we.
10:56
10:56
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
Well, we've got we've got that. But we don't. We are not investing in trying to create the culture that we want for our our children. We don't have public service broadcasting anymore. We don't have reinforced message reinforcement that littering is disgusting and unacceptable. And therefore and we've become tolerant of litter piling up everywhere. So it's become normalized. And until we realize that we have to invest in the society and the public realm that we want to see, and we don't, we have a laissez faire sort of, oh, we think everybody will behave, right? They don't.
It is a criminal offence to drop litter. It is a criminal offence to fly. Tip there are 1.3 million fly tips last year in this last full year, for which there's reporting available and less than 1500 prosecutions, most of which were not successful. The average fine was £600. Doesn't even go close to addressing the issue. So the point is, you've almost got no chance of being caught doing the wrong thing. None at all. And the penalties are tiny , and we don't invest in doing the right thing. And until we actually grasp that nettle and honest with ourselves, we're going to live in an increasingly decrepit, ugly, dirty, filthy, embarrassing country.
Now, not to say that there aren't areas which are beautiful around here. It's a lot better than most, let me tell you. But the thing that really bothers me most about the built environment is we've inherited in this country some incredibly beautiful structures from our forebears who built things to last a very, very long time. Stone bridges being a particular passion of mine. Most councils, and I don't accept this austerity thing because they're terrible at spending money. And I can give you examples of it. They have no clue how to negotiate a contract properly and get good value for money.
Endless examples of that in clean up Britain. But stone bridges are one that really bothers me. If the roads aren't swept, the debris and the detritus and the leaf mulch and what have you accumulates on the side of the road, and it grows deeper and deeper. And when it gets to a certain depth, trees can grow in it. And they do. I could take you to at least 50 bridges around the country, where there are trees growing out of stone bridges, roots going into the bed of that bridge. And these are things that we've inherited, and we're just absolutely failing on a grand scale to look after what we've inherited.
And so the cost, you know, we know the cost of everything and the value of absolutely nothing. But in doing so, if you buy cheap, you pay twice. And we're probably paying 4 or 5 times. We're going to have to rebuild a lot of the environment.
It is a criminal offence to drop litter. It is a criminal offence to fly. Tip there are 1.3 million fly tips last year in this last full year, for which there's reporting available and less than 1500 prosecutions, most of which were not successful. The average fine was £600. Doesn't even go close to addressing the issue. So the point is, you've almost got no chance of being caught doing the wrong thing. None at all. And the penalties are tiny , and we don't invest in doing the right thing. And until we actually grasp that nettle and honest with ourselves, we're going to live in an increasingly decrepit, ugly, dirty, filthy, embarrassing country.
Now, not to say that there aren't areas which are beautiful around here. It's a lot better than most, let me tell you. But the thing that really bothers me most about the built environment is we've inherited in this country some incredibly beautiful structures from our forebears who built things to last a very, very long time. Stone bridges being a particular passion of mine. Most councils, and I don't accept this austerity thing because they're terrible at spending money. And I can give you examples of it. They have no clue how to negotiate a contract properly and get good value for money.
Endless examples of that in clean up Britain. But stone bridges are one that really bothers me. If the roads aren't swept, the debris and the detritus and the leaf mulch and what have you accumulates on the side of the road, and it grows deeper and deeper. And when it gets to a certain depth, trees can grow in it. And they do. I could take you to at least 50 bridges around the country, where there are trees growing out of stone bridges, roots going into the bed of that bridge. And these are things that we've inherited, and we're just absolutely failing on a grand scale to look after what we've inherited.
And so the cost, you know, we know the cost of everything and the value of absolutely nothing. But in doing so, if you buy cheap, you pay twice. And we're probably paying 4 or 5 times. We're going to have to rebuild a lot of the environment.
10:59
10:59
Lord Cameron of Dillington
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Lord Cameron of Dillington
Thank you very much. First of all, this being the first time I've spoken as inquiry, I should declare an interest as a as a retired member of a farming family in Somerset with some property. My question is, as the chair has just said, is how does the quality of public spaces vary from region to region? And sort of. In addition to that, what I'd like to know is how do the solutions vary in terms of the existence of either bodies who might be focused on the problems, either regional bodies or even very, very local bodies, because I suspect that the very local ones are the more important ones.
And also in terms of is there a difference in terms of the money, which might or might not be available to put in, to provide solutions from region to region or from town to town? And sort of secondly, sorry, rather long question. Secondly, is there a difference in approach between cities and market towns, rural, smaller communities? I mean, the University of Portsmouth came up with a study in 2024 indicating that rural and green spaces were more likely to contain litter than urban areas. And, and I just sort of wondered whether we may be looking at city solutions, but actually these market towns are really important as well.
So let's start from the other end this time. Ed, do you want to go first?
And also in terms of is there a difference in terms of the money, which might or might not be available to put in, to provide solutions from region to region or from town to town? And sort of secondly, sorry, rather long question. Secondly, is there a difference in approach between cities and market towns, rural, smaller communities? I mean, the University of Portsmouth came up with a study in 2024 indicating that rural and green spaces were more likely to contain litter than urban areas. And, and I just sort of wondered whether we may be looking at city solutions, but actually these market towns are really important as well.
So let's start from the other end this time. Ed, do you want to go first?
11:01
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
Well, yes. I mean, it's a lot easier to sweep roads and pavements than it is to pull litter out of ditches. I mean, it's your question is incredibly comprehensive. So there is , I think the simplest way to answer it is that the in rural areas and semi-rural areas and market towns, the. There are many, many more. Putting together of different agencies for whom who hold the responsibility for any given situation. So , for example, the strategic road network is managed. I use the term loosely by national highways. Some of the signage is the responsibility of the local authority.
Some of the signage is the responsibility of national highways. Some of the verges belong to parish councils, some belong to county councils, some belong to national highways. And what they love more than anything else is to have an argument about whose bit of the area needs cleaning up. And that is a complete nonsense because very, very often they say, oh, we're doing something about it, which means they're holding a meeting with 39 people, none of whom have got a decision or a budget or a clue what's going on, and they just endlessly bat around letters and emails between one another.
So yes, of course there is. It's much simpler to keep urban areas clean. There isn't a north south divide on it. There is quite a lot of evidence that I've got in my pocket, but I'm not going to start reading it out because we don't have time, because it took me ages to find it. That shows that the level of deprivation, socioeconomic activity all plays a part, but in the end, we are not making enough effort as a country to make any particular area visually appealing, looking like somebody cares. And when it looks like people don't care, those that we're paying our tax money to.
And this is a real problem for all parties of, of any persuasion. When people start to feel on a grand scale that their tax money is not enabling them to live in a nice place of which they can be proud, it does spiral. There are mental health costs. There are other, you know, visitor attraction. Everything starts to spiral into a negative spiral of decline. And that's where we are, I'm afraid in a lot of areas, not all of them, obviously.
Some of the signage is the responsibility of national highways. Some of the verges belong to parish councils, some belong to county councils, some belong to national highways. And what they love more than anything else is to have an argument about whose bit of the area needs cleaning up. And that is a complete nonsense because very, very often they say, oh, we're doing something about it, which means they're holding a meeting with 39 people, none of whom have got a decision or a budget or a clue what's going on, and they just endlessly bat around letters and emails between one another.
So yes, of course there is. It's much simpler to keep urban areas clean. There isn't a north south divide on it. There is quite a lot of evidence that I've got in my pocket, but I'm not going to start reading it out because we don't have time, because it took me ages to find it. That shows that the level of deprivation, socioeconomic activity all plays a part, but in the end, we are not making enough effort as a country to make any particular area visually appealing, looking like somebody cares. And when it looks like people don't care, those that we're paying our tax money to.
And this is a real problem for all parties of, of any persuasion. When people start to feel on a grand scale that their tax money is not enabling them to live in a nice place of which they can be proud, it does spiral. There are mental health costs. There are other, you know, visitor attraction. Everything starts to spiral into a negative spiral of decline. And that's where we are, I'm afraid in a lot of areas, not all of them, obviously.
11:03
11:03
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
It was a great question. And I think the answer is it's there isn't a consistency and you get good right across the country and you get bad right across the country. There's an awful lot of bad parts of London, and there's some wonderful parts in Cornwall and Northumberland and right across the country. The problem we face is that it's often by accident rather than by design. And I spend a lot of time in Cornwall and suffer from having to pick up nappies from the layby where people have parked to go and enjoy the beautiful. The beauty of of the the Land's End and Sennen walk.
Yet they think it's acceptable to leave a nappy when they've changed a baby and people throw coffee cups onto the verges and the last Costa in in in the country is in Penzance and I feel like collecting them and taking them back to the Costa coffee shop to ask them to do something about it. So, so but but there's also we're talking, you know, what Ed is talking about and it's music to my ears. Ed is, is, is really tackling, trying to tackle this. What Ed is talking about is what we do to public space.
But there's also what do we, how do we design public space and how do we create more spaces for people and a beautification of the civic realm? And often those two things actually come together. If you do create beautiful places, people do often treat it well. And I was I'm very involved with Historic England, and I was on the Historic England High Street Action Zone board, and that was one of the most heartening things I've ever been involved in, because what you did see was the pride of place that people had, and it was actually made even more sort of special for people because of heritage, but also because we had a very strong cultural programme and people came out and owned that, and the places were were improved and but they were improved in the way that the people wanted them.
I would be very surprised if those places are degraded because they belong to the people. And so it's how we give places to people and who create those. And Ed's talked about the the dysfunction of the different overlapping authorities. Sometimes it is the community. And I want to shout out to Penzance, which you could eat a meal off the off the floor. And it's so clean. And so much of what has happened in Penzance is down to strong civic leadership from local people. A particular woman, Susan Stewart, who has leveraged in many, many millions of pounds for Penzance to to restore heritage buildings, to work with the council.
I'm not saying it's only Susan and only the community, but it's it's that partnership where bringing the local authority in and holding the local authority to account, as well as being really critical. And one final thought, and it goes back to culture and what I was talking about earlier, I once asked the Danish ambassador why Denmark is so beautiful and so, so perfectly designed and thought through. And his answer was that we that the Danish grow up give being given a civic realm that is theirs. And they grow up as young children, knowing that the spaces and the places that they grow, they grow up in, and the nurseries that they go to, and the bike lanes that they cycle along from the age of nothing virtually are theirs to enjoy and take care of.
And they grow up with a sense of ownership and aesthetic of, of what they have inherited. And they care for them and want to continue that that continuity of care is absolutely vital across generations.
Yet they think it's acceptable to leave a nappy when they've changed a baby and people throw coffee cups onto the verges and the last Costa in in in the country is in Penzance and I feel like collecting them and taking them back to the Costa coffee shop to ask them to do something about it. So, so but but there's also we're talking, you know, what Ed is talking about and it's music to my ears. Ed is, is, is really tackling, trying to tackle this. What Ed is talking about is what we do to public space.
But there's also what do we, how do we design public space and how do we create more spaces for people and a beautification of the civic realm? And often those two things actually come together. If you do create beautiful places, people do often treat it well. And I was I'm very involved with Historic England, and I was on the Historic England High Street Action Zone board, and that was one of the most heartening things I've ever been involved in, because what you did see was the pride of place that people had, and it was actually made even more sort of special for people because of heritage, but also because we had a very strong cultural programme and people came out and owned that, and the places were were improved and but they were improved in the way that the people wanted them.
I would be very surprised if those places are degraded because they belong to the people. And so it's how we give places to people and who create those. And Ed's talked about the the dysfunction of the different overlapping authorities. Sometimes it is the community. And I want to shout out to Penzance, which you could eat a meal off the off the floor. And it's so clean. And so much of what has happened in Penzance is down to strong civic leadership from local people. A particular woman, Susan Stewart, who has leveraged in many, many millions of pounds for Penzance to to restore heritage buildings, to work with the council.
I'm not saying it's only Susan and only the community, but it's it's that partnership where bringing the local authority in and holding the local authority to account, as well as being really critical. And one final thought, and it goes back to culture and what I was talking about earlier, I once asked the Danish ambassador why Denmark is so beautiful and so, so perfectly designed and thought through. And his answer was that we that the Danish grow up give being given a civic realm that is theirs. And they grow up as young children, knowing that the spaces and the places that they grow, they grow up in, and the nurseries that they go to, and the bike lanes that they cycle along from the age of nothing virtually are theirs to enjoy and take care of.
And they grow up with a sense of ownership and aesthetic of, of what they have inherited. And they care for them and want to continue that that continuity of care is absolutely vital across generations.
11:08
11:08
11:08
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Not that that's not important, but I just think we've got the experts here. So first question. Yes. I think there's massive regional differentiation. I don't think it's necessarily systemic for everything that there's a tendency for one part of the country to be far better or far worse. I'd almost put it into categories, which is. Sort of systematic of the fact that we have so many different complex systems governing everything from the kind of the bench to the phone box to the shop front to, you know, to the the public realm and the materials. So I'd say it starts from that begging bowl funding and council funding that we've had for quite a long time.
Maybe we're starting to see some of that change a bit more with sort of devolved funding being passed through to some areas. But not all. This means that you need really strong entrepreneurial council leaders. I do think there's some very good council leaders and very good officials as well, but they are we're making it really difficult for them to do nice things, whether, you know, whether it's through procurement processes, whether it's through the cost of planting a tree or the difficulty in planting a tree or changing the public realm material. So we've got good examples.
Darlington has had some amazing work. It's quite a while ago, sort of, I think about 20 years ago, had an amazing public realm improvement in their centre within the ring road. And Bradford has just had a huge new public realm scheme in the centre. That seems to be. I've not seen it personally, but it looks great from the photos and from what I've heard, Pavilion Road in London. Lots of people might have seen the changes that have happened there. And then that's kind of extending to to Sloane Street and other places, but that is relying on that entrepreneurial going out to two different pots and moving bits of money around in the complex way, I'd say, where you might have systematic improvements is maybe where you have got some of this more devolved funding where coming back to accountability, the person that has the purse strings also has control of the highways, which is a really small part of our country.
And I think highways is an area I'd really encourage people to look at where, yes, you might be the market town, you're the local planning authority. You can do everything in terms of what you permit, what you don't permit, some of the shopfronts, etc. but you're not unless you're unitary, you don't have control of the highways. Therefore that can just be scarred, changed, barren, asphalt laden, you know, devoid of trees because and you have no control or power on that. I think that that comes down to when you look where you look at, for example, your highways authorities, they would see a lot of these nice things.
We're talking about the bench just as a liability, you know, their own duty from 2004 Traffic Management Act is free flowing traffic. They don't have another duty. And yet actually highways is our public realm. Highways including pavements as well. An example where I've seen that improved would be Lincolnshire. So they put their highways team within a growth authority. Coming back to your your earlier point on growth and Baroness, which is that they are also incentivized to have the upside of planting the tree, putting in the natural drainage. You know, these are the the sort of low level planting which actually does a really important service of absorbing water, but could be planted with nice flowers and nice greenery.
They see the advantage of that.
Maybe we're starting to see some of that change a bit more with sort of devolved funding being passed through to some areas. But not all. This means that you need really strong entrepreneurial council leaders. I do think there's some very good council leaders and very good officials as well, but they are we're making it really difficult for them to do nice things, whether, you know, whether it's through procurement processes, whether it's through the cost of planting a tree or the difficulty in planting a tree or changing the public realm material. So we've got good examples.
Darlington has had some amazing work. It's quite a while ago, sort of, I think about 20 years ago, had an amazing public realm improvement in their centre within the ring road. And Bradford has just had a huge new public realm scheme in the centre. That seems to be. I've not seen it personally, but it looks great from the photos and from what I've heard, Pavilion Road in London. Lots of people might have seen the changes that have happened there. And then that's kind of extending to to Sloane Street and other places, but that is relying on that entrepreneurial going out to two different pots and moving bits of money around in the complex way, I'd say, where you might have systematic improvements is maybe where you have got some of this more devolved funding where coming back to accountability, the person that has the purse strings also has control of the highways, which is a really small part of our country.
And I think highways is an area I'd really encourage people to look at where, yes, you might be the market town, you're the local planning authority. You can do everything in terms of what you permit, what you don't permit, some of the shopfronts, etc. but you're not unless you're unitary, you don't have control of the highways. Therefore that can just be scarred, changed, barren, asphalt laden, you know, devoid of trees because and you have no control or power on that. I think that that comes down to when you look where you look at, for example, your highways authorities, they would see a lot of these nice things.
We're talking about the bench just as a liability, you know, their own duty from 2004 Traffic Management Act is free flowing traffic. They don't have another duty. And yet actually highways is our public realm. Highways including pavements as well. An example where I've seen that improved would be Lincolnshire. So they put their highways team within a growth authority. Coming back to your your earlier point on growth and Baroness, which is that they are also incentivized to have the upside of planting the tree, putting in the natural drainage. You know, these are the the sort of low level planting which actually does a really important service of absorbing water, but could be planted with nice flowers and nice greenery.
They see the advantage of that.
11:11
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
I'm going to force the pace a bit, because I know you've got to go, and I'd like to get through a few more questions before you do go. David Ashley. And then what we plan to do is to suspend this sitting. If the petitioner can stay after you've gone, we'll start again actually. So we will get through all the questions. But if you could keep your answers slightly shorter and members keep your questions slightly shorter as well.
So I'm going to ask Sue, Lady Miller actually to for her question.
So I'm going to ask Sue, Lady Miller actually to for her question.
11:12
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
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Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
Well thank you. This is absolutely fascinating so far. And actually, you've answered quite a lot of what I was going to ask about. First of all, I must just declare I have no interest in this inquiry as it's the first time I've spoken. So that's the formal bit out of the way. And there was one area that I think has improved since I started work in London in 1979, and that's dog poo. At this time of year, you could not walk along the pavement for fear that under every leaf there would be dog poo. So that oddly, has much improved.
And I feel there must be some lesson there that we could learn for the rest of this. I was also heartened by your reference, all of you, I think, to civic leadership and the importance of that, because actually, I think when questionnaires are given by councils as to what's important, rubbish collection is still right up there as it was when I was a council leader. My question really is, how do you get that link into the public mind between your parish council, your town council, whichever layer it is spending money on, first design and then maintenance, and the better outcomes that you've already described for the community?
And I feel there must be some lesson there that we could learn for the rest of this. I was also heartened by your reference, all of you, I think, to civic leadership and the importance of that, because actually, I think when questionnaires are given by councils as to what's important, rubbish collection is still right up there as it was when I was a council leader. My question really is, how do you get that link into the public mind between your parish council, your town council, whichever layer it is spending money on, first design and then maintenance, and the better outcomes that you've already described for the community?
11:13
11:13
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
I think that goes to the very heart of the issue that we have in the country at the moment, is that most children now leave school without any idea of how the state functions. Who does what, where, why, when my stepson is 19 and is now nearly 20 , and is completely baffled by how politics at all levels, local, up to national work doesn't really understand anything. And I think we've shied away in the education system and the reinforcement system, and trying to find a way to educate the next generation on how the state works and, and what you can do for your country, not what your country can do for you, to coin a phrase.
And we've just lost that ability to connect and educate people, for example, about dog poo bags and things like that. That was done by absolutely unceasing reinforcement, unceasing. And we don't have that before, when when I grew up, we had endless things about keeping Britain tidy. Well, keep Britain tidy. It may surprise you still does exist, but it's failed because Britain is not tidy on the main. So, you know, we need to find a different way of getting these messages reinforced. So yeah, there are some there are some high spots. But you know, the way you get the way you make the culture change is we've got to invest in the next generation.
And we have to be honest about that fact. Unless we drive that message home from a young age, like the Danes, we're if we if we have a laissez faire attitude to making this happen, what will happen? Nothing. Good. Laziness.
And we've just lost that ability to connect and educate people, for example, about dog poo bags and things like that. That was done by absolutely unceasing reinforcement, unceasing. And we don't have that before, when when I grew up, we had endless things about keeping Britain tidy. Well, keep Britain tidy. It may surprise you still does exist, but it's failed because Britain is not tidy on the main. So, you know, we need to find a different way of getting these messages reinforced. So yeah, there are some there are some high spots. But you know, the way you get the way you make the culture change is we've got to invest in the next generation.
And we have to be honest about that fact. Unless we drive that message home from a young age, like the Danes, we're if we if we have a laissez faire attitude to making this happen, what will happen? Nothing. Good. Laziness.
11:15
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
I want to you know, I agree with what you've just said, Ed, and add. I think we have to invest in continually invest in the in the spaces that people are in and show that we care about them and their experience, which was my approach in Central London partnership. I wanted London to put its arm around people in a subliminal way and say welcome by making it an easier place to be and to walk in and. And it's a very subliminally making the facility so legible. London, the wayfinding system was, was part of that to help people navigate around London, because it was not easy for people who only knew the mental map of the tube, for example.
So when we have a situation where the Jubilee Bridge, the bridge, what used to be called Hungerford Bridge has probably not seen a jet wash in probably most of its life, and there's inches of dirt accreted over it. I think we're telling people something that we don't really care about them. There's something fundamental about the message we're giving out and and why this is, you know, one of the most tourist important spaces in London in terms of the River Thames and the and the amount of tourists that go across there. But the, the, the, the, the lift is in sanitary if it's used at all.
So there's a degradation in, in lots of places and it's not everywhere. Witnessed Penzance but lots of other places, you know, are well maintained. But it's as, as you said, it needs constant reinforcement. And then eventually you can pull back from that constant reinforcement and, and enforcement. But you have to, as I've already said, sweat the small stuff constantly. And, and we've also got the situation, I think you've alluded to it, of the maintenance of the pavement. And we did a lot in central London in terms of utilities and utilities digging up the road and the reinstatement of utilities.
So if you've got work, create streets called Street Scars on what was once a very lovely set of granite steps in, say, Monmouth Street in in Covent Garden, which was a particularly famous example. You know, you've just got this low level sort of sense of, of we don't care about this and we don't care about you. So invest in, in the management and the enforcement. And through that, you are subliminally investing people.
So when we have a situation where the Jubilee Bridge, the bridge, what used to be called Hungerford Bridge has probably not seen a jet wash in probably most of its life, and there's inches of dirt accreted over it. I think we're telling people something that we don't really care about them. There's something fundamental about the message we're giving out and and why this is, you know, one of the most tourist important spaces in London in terms of the River Thames and the and the amount of tourists that go across there. But the, the, the, the, the lift is in sanitary if it's used at all.
So there's a degradation in, in lots of places and it's not everywhere. Witnessed Penzance but lots of other places, you know, are well maintained. But it's as, as you said, it needs constant reinforcement. And then eventually you can pull back from that constant reinforcement and, and enforcement. But you have to, as I've already said, sweat the small stuff constantly. And, and we've also got the situation, I think you've alluded to it, of the maintenance of the pavement. And we did a lot in central London in terms of utilities and utilities digging up the road and the reinstatement of utilities.
So if you've got work, create streets called Street Scars on what was once a very lovely set of granite steps in, say, Monmouth Street in in Covent Garden, which was a particularly famous example. You know, you've just got this low level sort of sense of, of we don't care about this and we don't care about you. So invest in, in the management and the enforcement. And through that, you are subliminally investing people.
11:17
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
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Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
Thank you. David, just before you reply, can I ask you also to include in your answer as you're involved in the design, the implication that it's actually people aren't walking or cycling as much, and perhaps that's contributed to the culture of not caring because they're driving past. Is that something that you've seen?
11:18
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Yeah, I wasn't going to mention that, but actually it's a prompt. We we've, it's a really good phrase, which is sort of driving architecture and walking architecture. I'm talking about buildings here, which is sort of you go past at 50 miles an hour. It doesn't really matter if it's an Amazon warehouse style building or if it's very bland or passive or a dull material. There's no kind of detail because you're not going to see it. Whereas if you walk well, sorry to want to walk, you want to have the kind of variance in the shopfronts, the facades, the sort of verticality that change subtly.
It sort of rhymes, but is a little bit different but isn't too jarring. And a lot of our built environment is kind of screaming to you like, don't walk here. And we sort of, we don't care about what this looks like. We don't want this to be an interesting experience. And one of the phrases I've also really like is the kind of cherry blossom moment, which is on your commute. You could probably have a slightly longer commute. That's not very nice for 75% of the time. It's all right, we're getting to work. But if you have that one moment where you're maybe cycling or walking through a park and the flowers are out and the cherry blossoms are out, you sort of you feel good about that.
That's your kind of your brain's peak, basically. And that's the bit you'll remember apart from when you're walking through the office door. So I do think that's a really important point. And I was going to, I guess my two points on this would be, I do think the culture can be downstream of the built environment. So lots of people, since you mentioned cycling, talk about Amsterdam and everyone in the culture is different. We all cycle. Well, they didn't back in the 60s. If you if you look at the pictures of all the streets, they're they're very sort of congested and busy.
And it was a sort of oil crisis led to them kind of changing the way they they build their streets. But then the culture sort of downstream of that. And I think the same, I might say, for the littering now, which is if you sort of have a culture that there are bags outside, even if actually the system is saying, put the bags outside, this is how we do our rubbish refuse in London in particular, then other people will assume that's what you can do with the Costa Cup. You can just pop it next to it or the the phone box.
It's not used anymore. It's got loads of posters on it, graffiti on it. Well, you might as well just put some bin bags next to that as well, even if you're not meant to. A couple of you were asking about solutions. A couple of things we're looking at. One is street design codes. So back to the the street scars, the asphalt being ripped up. One of the arguments from the utility companies is, oh, well, we can't find the materials to put back. I'm not sure I agree with that necessarily. But if you have a county wide code which says here's good, better, best materials, we know everyone's going to use these ones.
We're going to have three stores of these in a couple of centralized locations. There's no excuse really for utility company to take six months. But then I to sort of answer your very first question around what what we can do, you know, why is this? I would make the argument on the hidden lever and the sort of the hidden wiring theory, which is a lots of policy and legislation is leading to these systems being in place. So one would be the new Roads and Street Works Act 1991. This sets out the fine for a for a utility company, which is two and a half grand.
That was 1991 and it's not changed. So actually the cost to them of not repairing this yorkstone or this granite, it's a business decision. You know, I'm, you know, it's sort of incentivizes you not to do that. And it says you have six months to do this. I think six months is too long a time because we know there's continuous repairs. You know, that that really could be brought down to three months to two months.
It sort of rhymes, but is a little bit different but isn't too jarring. And a lot of our built environment is kind of screaming to you like, don't walk here. And we sort of, we don't care about what this looks like. We don't want this to be an interesting experience. And one of the phrases I've also really like is the kind of cherry blossom moment, which is on your commute. You could probably have a slightly longer commute. That's not very nice for 75% of the time. It's all right, we're getting to work. But if you have that one moment where you're maybe cycling or walking through a park and the flowers are out and the cherry blossoms are out, you sort of you feel good about that.
That's your kind of your brain's peak, basically. And that's the bit you'll remember apart from when you're walking through the office door. So I do think that's a really important point. And I was going to, I guess my two points on this would be, I do think the culture can be downstream of the built environment. So lots of people, since you mentioned cycling, talk about Amsterdam and everyone in the culture is different. We all cycle. Well, they didn't back in the 60s. If you if you look at the pictures of all the streets, they're they're very sort of congested and busy.
And it was a sort of oil crisis led to them kind of changing the way they they build their streets. But then the culture sort of downstream of that. And I think the same, I might say, for the littering now, which is if you sort of have a culture that there are bags outside, even if actually the system is saying, put the bags outside, this is how we do our rubbish refuse in London in particular, then other people will assume that's what you can do with the Costa Cup. You can just pop it next to it or the the phone box.
It's not used anymore. It's got loads of posters on it, graffiti on it. Well, you might as well just put some bin bags next to that as well, even if you're not meant to. A couple of you were asking about solutions. A couple of things we're looking at. One is street design codes. So back to the the street scars, the asphalt being ripped up. One of the arguments from the utility companies is, oh, well, we can't find the materials to put back. I'm not sure I agree with that necessarily. But if you have a county wide code which says here's good, better, best materials, we know everyone's going to use these ones.
We're going to have three stores of these in a couple of centralized locations. There's no excuse really for utility company to take six months. But then I to sort of answer your very first question around what what we can do, you know, why is this? I would make the argument on the hidden lever and the sort of the hidden wiring theory, which is a lots of policy and legislation is leading to these systems being in place. So one would be the new Roads and Street Works Act 1991. This sets out the fine for a for a utility company, which is two and a half grand.
That was 1991 and it's not changed. So actually the cost to them of not repairing this yorkstone or this granite, it's a business decision. You know, I'm, you know, it's sort of incentivizes you not to do that. And it says you have six months to do this. I think six months is too long a time because we know there's continuous repairs. You know, that that really could be brought down to three months to two months.
11:21
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
I am going to move on because of time. Can I just ask Patricia to write write something for us particular, you mentioned the bids, which was a really important initiative and relating to this question about how a decent environment created or helped to foster the notion of a business district. Could you send something in, in writing some homework about the relationship between these issues and what it took to create the business in the bid itself, whether there is a lesson that can be learned there that's also transferable. Actually, I'm going to move on actually to Lord Bailey, because we're coming on to bigger political issues now, actually, and then we can come back to solutions, I hope, actually, and towards the end.
11:22
Lord Bailey of Paddington
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Lord Bailey of Paddington
Thank you. Morning. And I have to say, I have tremendous sympathy for how you started. I think the country is an absolute disgrace, and it's mostly because people throw rubbish everywhere. Do poor quality and degraded public spaces influence wider political narratives? All of you have talked about caring. You know, it looks like you don't care. We've had people who've given us evidence on completely separate subjects, who've also alluded to the fact that the state of your environment and its maintenance or not, means that a particular community might not feel cared for. So is there a narrative?
I don't want to lead a narrative, but do those narratives stick together? And I just want to add a little there's a tension here because to my mind, there's different types of, of, of public spaces. You utility the roads we need, you need a road. There's beautiful spaces, I don't know, white cliffs of Dover. And then there's more managed spaces like King's Cross, for instance, which is a public square. So how does the the way those three different worlds appear affect how people talk about the state of, of, of the country? And just one thing, one of the ugliest things that ever happened to London is cycling lanes, by the way.
But if I start with Patricia, if you could start, please.
I don't want to lead a narrative, but do those narratives stick together? And I just want to add a little there's a tension here because to my mind, there's different types of, of, of public spaces. You utility the roads we need, you need a road. There's beautiful spaces, I don't know, white cliffs of Dover. And then there's more managed spaces like King's Cross, for instance, which is a public square. So how does the the way those three different worlds appear affect how people talk about the state of, of, of the country? And just one thing, one of the ugliest things that ever happened to London is cycling lanes, by the way.
But if I start with Patricia, if you could start, please.
11:23
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Thank you very much. I do think it does play into political narratives and drive what people think about how they are thought about in places. If I go back to my earlier answer, which is, you know, it does show if we're not, if our streets and spaces are not maintained, it does rather say that the, the, the, the people of those places are not being considered. And but one person's view of what good looks like is very different to another. So it isn't I can't I don't think it can be a blanket response or blanket answer.
If you take Oxford Street, for example, because, you know, I've never seen so many column inches about a temporary pedestrianisation of a street as I have about the one kilometre of Oxford Street that's just been closed off to the public. So many people love that space, and it's driving one narrative. And then there's so many other people who don't want like the pedestrianisation, and it's driving another narrative. And that's actually been a really interesting political football for 30 years, Oxford Street. So I think I do think it's important in terms of local democracy , that the people who are representing you listen to what's important, whether that's anti-social behaviour in in the public spaces or whether it's littering, which is also anti-social behaviour.
And so, yes, that's my answer to you.
If you take Oxford Street, for example, because, you know, I've never seen so many column inches about a temporary pedestrianisation of a street as I have about the one kilometre of Oxford Street that's just been closed off to the public. So many people love that space, and it's driving one narrative. And then there's so many other people who don't want like the pedestrianisation, and it's driving another narrative. And that's actually been a really interesting political football for 30 years, Oxford Street. So I think I do think it's important in terms of local democracy , that the people who are representing you listen to what's important, whether that's anti-social behaviour in in the public spaces or whether it's littering, which is also anti-social behaviour.
And so, yes, that's my answer to you.
11:25
11:25
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I yes, I think is the answer I would give on this one. I would use train stations, I think, to kind of illustrate my answer. When we think about arriving into Saint Pancras, I would call that a public realm. It's public space. It's one of our train stations. Probably easier if you're getting off Eurostar rather than getting on with the queues. But once you get off, you know you're out into beautiful environment and absolutely incredible station. We we can and we do poll people on do you like this? Do you find this attractive? And I agree everyone has different views.
But sort of if we ask everyone their views, we can start to find some consensus in what people like and what people don't like. And a public space, I think, you know, seeking to find consensus in that makes sense for me. Contrast that to arriving on the West Coast main line into Euston and how you might feel, especially as a tourist or just a visitor, you know, local or international, your first impression is going to dictate, I think, a little bit how you feel about that country. You know, it's the same we see with airports as well.
So I do think it has an impact on the wider discourse of, you know, do people think this country is succeeding or failing or middling? And I would also point to all the the bits that I've raised, you know, your bins, your, your your litter is a sign of state competence or of that kind of everyday competence. I kind of use the analogy, you know, if you're going into someone's living room, you might have very nice, you know, very nice furniture, very nice carpets, but there's a big stain or it's ripped up or there's a litter bag in the corner that's leaking.
You know, that there's a sort of failure of ownership and passion and love going on.
But sort of if we ask everyone their views, we can start to find some consensus in what people like and what people don't like. And a public space, I think, you know, seeking to find consensus in that makes sense for me. Contrast that to arriving on the West Coast main line into Euston and how you might feel, especially as a tourist or just a visitor, you know, local or international, your first impression is going to dictate, I think, a little bit how you feel about that country. You know, it's the same we see with airports as well.
So I do think it has an impact on the wider discourse of, you know, do people think this country is succeeding or failing or middling? And I would also point to all the the bits that I've raised, you know, your bins, your, your your litter is a sign of state competence or of that kind of everyday competence. I kind of use the analogy, you know, if you're going into someone's living room, you might have very nice, you know, very nice furniture, very nice carpets, but there's a big stain or it's ripped up or there's a litter bag in the corner that's leaking.
You know, that there's a sort of failure of ownership and passion and love going on.
11:27
11:27
Lord Gascoigne
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Lord Gascoigne
Cultural question. That that's really good. Can I just start. Yeah. The, the first bit that you said is I think that all the political class need to be very, very, very, very careful on what's going on at the moment. Because when there's a cost, cost of living pressures and it's constantly reinforced that we're being taxed more than we've ever been taxed before. And then you see the public realm visibly in too many places. I know it's not everywhere, but unfortunately, with clean up Britain, we don't often get people calling us up saying, this is great, come and have a look.
It's always where there's something falling down. I think that that really puts a huge distrust, not just in the political leadership, but all levels of government, local authority. I think you've also got to this is not a political point, but you do have to be aware. For example, I'm choosing my words carefully. Michael O'Leary had never run an airline until he ran Ryanair. And he's a very good operator. Local authorities are not places where people in the private sector go to find incredible entrepreneurial talent. It's never happened. I don't think a chief executive of any council has ever been poached by a private organization for their incredible entrepreneurial, go getting spirit.
That's a problem. Most of these people complain they don't have enough money, they don't have enough money because they honestly, the wastage in local authority is unbelievable. It's unacceptable. It's dreadful. This is the unseen thing that people don't talk about. There is enough money being spent on running this country. It's just being spent incredibly badly. The role of the National Audit Office, we can talk about that as well. Back to bins, because that was your punchline. There are virtually no bins in Japan. We all saw the Japanese football fans picking up the litter after the football matches.
It's cultural. I don't know about, you know, the Danish, whether they have lots of bins. I went into a layby last night where there was a bin. It was an empty bin and less than, oh, three paces from the bin, pile of rubbish. So again, we are allowing and permitting people to get away with being unbelievably selfish and lazy. And the only time that you can really reinforce the behaviour that we need to have, and I know teachers will feel put upon, but clearly there are too many parents who aren't giving the children the grounding they need.
Now, for me, as a just as a judgment, I think there should be a cross-party consensus that one should never, under any circumstance, the education budget and the investment in the next generation should only ever go one way and only ever up, because otherwise we're just going to build up problems for the future. We need to nurture children to behave in the way that we want them to behave in the future, and we're not doing it, and we don't need bins.
It's always where there's something falling down. I think that that really puts a huge distrust, not just in the political leadership, but all levels of government, local authority. I think you've also got to this is not a political point, but you do have to be aware. For example, I'm choosing my words carefully. Michael O'Leary had never run an airline until he ran Ryanair. And he's a very good operator. Local authorities are not places where people in the private sector go to find incredible entrepreneurial talent. It's never happened. I don't think a chief executive of any council has ever been poached by a private organization for their incredible entrepreneurial, go getting spirit.
That's a problem. Most of these people complain they don't have enough money, they don't have enough money because they honestly, the wastage in local authority is unbelievable. It's unacceptable. It's dreadful. This is the unseen thing that people don't talk about. There is enough money being spent on running this country. It's just being spent incredibly badly. The role of the National Audit Office, we can talk about that as well. Back to bins, because that was your punchline. There are virtually no bins in Japan. We all saw the Japanese football fans picking up the litter after the football matches.
It's cultural. I don't know about, you know, the Danish, whether they have lots of bins. I went into a layby last night where there was a bin. It was an empty bin and less than, oh, three paces from the bin, pile of rubbish. So again, we are allowing and permitting people to get away with being unbelievably selfish and lazy. And the only time that you can really reinforce the behaviour that we need to have, and I know teachers will feel put upon, but clearly there are too many parents who aren't giving the children the grounding they need.
Now, for me, as a just as a judgment, I think there should be a cross-party consensus that one should never, under any circumstance, the education budget and the investment in the next generation should only ever go one way and only ever up, because otherwise we're just going to build up problems for the future. We need to nurture children to behave in the way that we want them to behave in the future, and we're not doing it, and we don't need bins.
11:30
Lord Bailey of Paddington
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Lord Bailey of Paddington
I happen to agree to a slight bit, and I just want to quickly end on Patricia, because one of the things you realize when you when you when you're in Parliament, lots of people's self-belief is, is based on treating everybody else as if they're a victim. I come from a very poor community. Almost nothing that was good was, was, was foisted on us. We came up with ourselves. And to what extent should we be challenging the public, local people to take charge of the environment they're in? So there's a piece about littering. I fully get that.
But I used to live on an estate. It was an absolute mess and we had lots of crime and we petitioned to get lights . And then we made the young people, made these mosaics. And wherever we put the lights and there's a mosaic, the behavior was transformed. But we we keep talking about what the government should do and where local authorities have failed or succeeded. How do we build that trust piece? By saying to people, actually, you have a stake in this and you should do it as well.
But I used to live on an estate. It was an absolute mess and we had lots of crime and we petitioned to get lights . And then we made the young people, made these mosaics. And wherever we put the lights and there's a mosaic, the behavior was transformed. But we we keep talking about what the government should do and where local authorities have failed or succeeded. How do we build that trust piece? By saying to people, actually, you have a stake in this and you should do it as well.
11:31
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
So was that addressed to me? I think it's such an important point, if I may. Thank you. It's agency is really important in everything we do in life. And I think that's also an educational thing, whether it's it's parental or people who help raise a child to believe that they they have agency is really important. And I, some years ago, I was walking along Upper Escalator in Westminster when a very well-heeled man put his coffee cup on the top of the escalator, and I asked him to take it with him. And he turned to me and said, it will be cleared up.
And I said, and we have to pay for that. And. And so he then said, are you a school teacher? He took his cup. But, you know, people assume if you want something to be done that's better or different, you know, you've got a position of authority. And, and I think we've got what we've got. And this is a bit of a complicated thing about where we're talking about here, because what we're we have what you're, what we're talking about is a product of success. We have made so much difference to our public realm over the past 25 years.
And that should be celebrated in what we're talking about. What we haven't made a difference to is how that public realm is managed and how we all act within that. And I think we've been too successful in actually taking the litter away and managing the litter, despite what I said earlier about the leave behind culture. And, and we've taken away the sense of agency that I grew up with because I was fed on Keep Britain Tidy campaigns, as Ed has already alluded to.
And I said, and we have to pay for that. And. And so he then said, are you a school teacher? He took his cup. But, you know, people assume if you want something to be done that's better or different, you know, you've got a position of authority. And, and I think we've got what we've got. And this is a bit of a complicated thing about where we're talking about here, because what we're we have what you're, what we're talking about is a product of success. We have made so much difference to our public realm over the past 25 years.
And that should be celebrated in what we're talking about. What we haven't made a difference to is how that public realm is managed and how we all act within that. And I think we've been too successful in actually taking the litter away and managing the litter, despite what I said earlier about the leave behind culture. And, and we've taken away the sense of agency that I grew up with because I was fed on Keep Britain Tidy campaigns, as Ed has already alluded to.
11:32
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Just very quickly to add on, I think it's a really good point. We. I think we need to allow local people to to do more in the public realm. And there's I think we push them out. So one of the things we're looking at is a right to plant sort of talking about, you know, growing up in different estates, we hear so many stories of people that put pot plants or decorate or try and green up their little areas and they get a letter straight away saying fire eggs. So get rid of this and, you know, massive space, you can't do this.
But even just allowing people, the Dutch do this as well. They have a little strip just outside your front garden or, you know, the boundary of your house. You're allowed to put wherever you are, you want in that. And again, we see case studies of little new streets. And people have put some plants out and they get told, take it away. So there's a sort of over regulation or not, not allowing local people to, to do this. And on the trust bit, we planted some trees in Grimsby and we were told they're going to get ripped down, tiny little trees.
Everyone will vandalize them. But actually we got the kids and the football team and a few other people to plant them, and then they had ownership of it. But I think people don't think they're allowed to.
But even just allowing people, the Dutch do this as well. They have a little strip just outside your front garden or, you know, the boundary of your house. You're allowed to put wherever you are, you want in that. And again, we see case studies of little new streets. And people have put some plants out and they get told, take it away. So there's a sort of over regulation or not, not allowing local people to, to do this. And on the trust bit, we planted some trees in Grimsby and we were told they're going to get ripped down, tiny little trees.
Everyone will vandalize them. But actually we got the kids and the football team and a few other people to plant them, and then they had ownership of it. But I think people don't think they're allowed to.
11:33
11:34
11:34
Lord Porter of Spalding
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Lord Porter of Spalding
Being late, but blame British Rail for that and the roadworks on the way to the train station. I have to declare my register of interest because it's the first time I've spoke. So I do apologize for people that we don't trust you to be able to read my register. I have to read it out for you. Strategic advisor, the Kingsgate Place based development company that does place shaping as well as just building. Non-exec director of Norse Group. We work with lots of councils across country doing blue collar work and stuff. What else is relevant on here?
Strategic advisor to a big procurement company, whatever councils by whatever the defence team and the team by. They've probably been part of the solution for that. And I'm also a member of well, I'm the chairman of of Clean Streets, which is one of the largest funders of Keep Britain Tidy. So I should have declared an Chairman of of Clean Streets, which is one of the largest funders of Keep Britain Tidy. So I, I should have declared an interest there, but I couldn't be bothered to get into that space and have a row with him about that.
But I am going to get. Sorry about this. Ed, you are going to have to be able to supply some evidence to. suggest that local government is awash with money on the basis that. 87% of the pounds that go into local government get spent on adult services, children's services and homelessness. Finding anything in the remaining. 13% is the devil's own job to do, and I couldn't go by without letting somebody at least try to defend my colleagues in local government, even though I'm not no longer part of it. And can we all please remember that the rubbish on the streets isn't put there by anybody in .
Strategic advisor to a big procurement company, whatever councils by whatever the defence team and the team by. They've probably been part of the solution for that. And I'm also a member of well, I'm the chairman of of Clean Streets, which is one of the largest funders of Keep Britain Tidy. So I should have declared an Chairman of of Clean Streets, which is one of the largest funders of Keep Britain Tidy. So I, I should have declared an interest there, but I couldn't be bothered to get into that space and have a row with him about that.
But I am going to get. Sorry about this. Ed, you are going to have to be able to supply some evidence to. suggest that local government is awash with money on the basis that. 87% of the pounds that go into local government get spent on adult services, children's services and homelessness. Finding anything in the remaining. 13% is the devil's own job to do, and I couldn't go by without letting somebody at least try to defend my colleagues in local government, even though I'm not no longer part of it. And can we all please remember that the rubbish on the streets isn't put there by anybody in .
11:35
11:35
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Could you make a very short reply to that or would you? I. Yes, of course, you're absolutely right. I meant in the in the, the generic tax take provides us with enough money, not. You know, I am aware that adult social care is an enormous drain, I think. But but that that that whole issue that I hope that we will be able to address is the whole way in which we fund more or less.
11:36
11:36
11:36
Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon
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Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon
Can I turn to Baroness Lawrence actually to follow up? Okay. I have a question for Patricia, but I think I'll wait and come back to that. That was when you were answering one of the questions before. So my question is, is about to what extent do you think concerns and narratives about the maintenance of public public space are based on.
11:37
11:37
11:37
11:37
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Oh, I think, I think that that the totemic issue is to go back to, to, to potholes, for example. I mean, you know, we shouldn't even be talking about them because if we actually had a proper maintenance. programme for the roadway and the drainage and the. associated verges and everything else, you don't get potholes. If you if you know, it is back to what I said at the beginning. If you maintain something very well, it'll look after you for a long time. I'm about to move into a house that's. 550 years old. It's only still standing because it's been maintained well enough to make it last.
You know, we we can see here in London with bridges.
You know, we we can see here in London with bridges.
11:37
11:37
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
You know, and some of them being closed for a very long time because they simply tried to scrimp and save on maintenance over the period. They were perfectly good, and they could have been kept up to a good standard. So I don't accept that this is sort of hearsay and nonsense. I could give you. examples of I, you know. signposts that have just rotted through on their legs, which is, you know, which is a bizarre some of these big signposts on the side of the road. I don't know how much you drive the motorways, but they are, they are in danger of toppling over onto vehicles blowing into the roadway.
We've got somebody sitting listening to this session, Sean. Behind me, there are certain motorways where the central reservation is just awash with ash trees. Well, those roots are going to wreck the. carriageway and nothing is being done to chop them down and and just preserve things. The the example I gave you about the stone bridges, I could go on and on. It doesn't matter what the public realm item is. It could be a bridge, a sign,
We've got somebody sitting listening to this session, Sean. Behind me, there are certain motorways where the central reservation is just awash with ash trees. Well, those roots are going to wreck the. carriageway and nothing is being done to chop them down and and just preserve things. The the example I gave you about the stone bridges, I could go on and on. It doesn't matter what the public realm item is. It could be a bridge, a sign,
11:38
11:38
11:38
Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I say even the Houses of Parliament is like forward thinking we talk about. Yeah, two short termism, short term. There are certain things in this country that we need connectivity and continuance. between governments of whatever colour, and they need to sit way above party politics because they're part of the fabric of where we live. To what you were saying about the Danes. I find it incredibly . depressing that too often .
11:38
11:39
11:39
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Should we go to David? Because I know David wants to leave, and then we come to Patricia. Absolutely. Yeah. I, I don't have a sort of robust data set to say there's a huge amount of evidence that this is a problem. But I think when we the quantity of conversations that we have and we, you know, we have a charity as well that goes up and down the country, the Great Streets Foundation to, to work with community groups to make their places nicer where there isn't the sort of state capacity to, you know, put in nice attractive design pavements or public spaces.
It comes up again, again and again. The quality of whether it's litter or the quality of the pavement or the quality of the park or the lack of greenery is impacting their lives. So I think I have to sort of accept that and value that as a as a piece of evidence. I think there's something around the kind of temporary nature of a lot of the work that we've been doing for a while in terms of our public realm, which is important to look at, which is, you know, if you have a smallish. budget to try and improve a city, I might even use Oxford.
Actually, the quality public realm in Oxford is actually really, really quite low. If you think about this as the second most visited city outside of London and, you know, should be asked or one of our crown jewels, and I know they're trying to do stuff about it, but you could try and do a little bit across the whole city. And I think that's what we've been doing is just kind of spreading the butter a bit too thin. Whereas actually, if we don't have the money, which we don't at the moment in terms of that, that capital pot, then we need to just be looking at, you know, a couple of hundred metres this year and then next year and then next year.
But up to a point to a level of quality that's going to maintain and survive and not be redone in five years. And it's that applies to potholes as well. It's probably not about pothole filling. It's about actually, when you redo these roads, changing the way that you actually build them. I'm not a expert, but I know .
It comes up again, again and again. The quality of whether it's litter or the quality of the pavement or the quality of the park or the lack of greenery is impacting their lives. So I think I have to sort of accept that and value that as a as a piece of evidence. I think there's something around the kind of temporary nature of a lot of the work that we've been doing for a while in terms of our public realm, which is important to look at, which is, you know, if you have a smallish. budget to try and improve a city, I might even use Oxford.
Actually, the quality public realm in Oxford is actually really, really quite low. If you think about this as the second most visited city outside of London and, you know, should be asked or one of our crown jewels, and I know they're trying to do stuff about it, but you could try and do a little bit across the whole city. And I think that's what we've been doing is just kind of spreading the butter a bit too thin. Whereas actually, if we don't have the money, which we don't at the moment in terms of that, that capital pot, then we need to just be looking at, you know, a couple of hundred metres this year and then next year and then next year.
But up to a point to a level of quality that's going to maintain and survive and not be redone in five years. And it's that applies to potholes as well. It's probably not about pothole filling. It's about actually, when you redo these roads, changing the way that you actually build them. I'm not a expert, but I know .
11:41
11:41
11:41
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Would you say is more responsible? I should be taking more action. Oxford's interest. I mean, it's it's non-unitary. So you've got your city. council looking at planning, then you've got your county council looking at roads. And then in a couple of years, I think it's going to change and become a mayoralty. So I think it's because you have lots of different owners of these spaces. And I think one of the big arguments the council would, I think justifiably say is, why the hell are the colleges with all this sort of long term investment not getting more involved?
And that's maybe to the point of Lord Bailey's question around how do we have more agency of individuals? How do we have more agency of businesses as well? Because if the businesses are helping to create a nicer place, they're going to see their business takes go up as well. So we need to try and bring in a bit more of that sort of finance support and. ownership of these streets, which where you sort of to the point of, do children know who runs the bits of councils and government? I don't think most adults know who runs bits of councils and governments.
So it is very .
And that's maybe to the point of Lord Bailey's question around how do we have more agency of individuals? How do we have more agency of businesses as well? Because if the businesses are helping to create a nicer place, they're going to see their business takes go up as well. So we need to try and bring in a bit more of that sort of finance support and. ownership of these streets, which where you sort of to the point of, do children know who runs the bits of councils and government? I don't think most adults know who runs bits of councils and governments.
So it is very .
11:42
11:42
11:42
11:42
11:42
11:42
Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon
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Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon
Rubbish in front of my house and it was in front of my car. So in the end I had to move it out the way. Otherwise I'm going to run out. And there was bottles. There was all sorts of things in this bag, so I dumped, I sort of moved it to one side thinking, okay, the roads and somebody will come and clear it up as they do their daily work or weekly. And it was there for about 3 or 4 days and nothing happened. It would just sit there. And of course, while I was moving, it was all dog feces and stuff was in there.
It was a nasty, nasty thing. So it comes down to responsibility. And I know when it comes to local.
It was a nasty, nasty thing. So it comes down to responsibility. And I know when it comes to local.
11:43
11:43
11:43
11:43
11:43
Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
But in that sense. So you've you know, somebody made that problem your problem to deal with. And so it should, strictly speaking, be the Council. And it depends on, I would imagine, on your your street cleaning regime. I want to also pay tribute to the local. authorities who do manage the streets as well as they do on very. limited budgets, for the reason we heard earlier, you know, in terms of the demands of adult social care and everything. But, you know, where I where I spend most of my time in Southwark, that bag would possibly sit on the street for quite some time because it doesn't fit into the cleaning machine, the cleaning regime.
And I'm probably the one that would phone up the council and ask if they could actually get a van round to pick it up. And it just goes back to that agency again, doesn't it? We we have a housing multiple.
And I'm probably the one that would phone up the council and ask if they could actually get a van round to pick it up. And it just goes back to that agency again, doesn't it? We we have a housing multiple.
11:44
Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
A very well maintained one on the corner of my road. And recently they've had some new tenants who are not doing what they should do with bins. And they were like, they were bad for about four weeks. It was me that phoned up the, the manager and, and you know, I'm not saying aren't I wonderful, but it's , it's all us having some form of. ownership in in this . You .
11:44
11:44
11:44
11:44
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Phone up the council. It's okay to make one point. There's. I think a lot of this is also the system just working as we've designed it. So one example would be Bond Street. So we did a project with Central District Alliance. Talking of bids. There were 47 private. operators who are collecting the business waste. So that obviously generates a huge amount of vehicle trips, which are sort of a side environmental point. But actually the. council will be expecting this to be the case. And how can you expect them to know? Okay, well, this is, you know, operator.
37 and this is this is 12 and of when they're going to go. So what they did is they clubbed together to have a.
37 and this is this is 12 and of when they're going to go. So what they did is they clubbed together to have a.
11:45
Speaker 2
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Speaker 2
Essentially like a refuse club. So they, they all pull together, actually negotiated reduce the price. So I think we need to see more examples such as Camden doing that. And then also they looked at phone boxes. I think this is actually an area where you can use AI. You have this very complicated bureaucratic process. How can we expect citizens to know this? Well, actually, you can automate a lot of this. So we sort of produced a very simple. application called booth Buster to basically, you could take a photo of a phone box and they all have, there's about 5 or 6 different types of.
11:46
11:46
11:46
Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
This blight, which I think there's some really effective things to do. And David, I'm afraid we have to stop momentarily for David to get to his other meeting. So we're going to stop for. five minutes to have a bit of a reset. We can continue this actually with Patricia and Ed, but we do have to say goodbye to David. I'm very sorry, Dave, because you've been a .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And welcome back to Lady Lawrence. Yes. Thank you for the opportunity to just cut in on that question. It raises a good spotlight on the legislation. So when somebody dumps rubbish inside the curtilage of your property, you've had a fly tip on your property. It's then legally, according to the laws of the land, it's your problem, it's your problem. It's your problem to clear up, which is you're a victim of a crime for which you're then expected to pay. This is a big problem for National Trust Forestry Commission. farmers as. And it's disgraceful. That should not.
Because then the incentive. I mean, it's almost for a cash strapped council. It's. Oh, phew, it's gone on somebody else's land. So that's an appalling thing. But the minute you then go and put it out on the street, you've legally committed a crime because you fly tipped. And then that's an absurdity. And but that's just a tiny, tiny, tiny example of where the legislative framework mitigates against people doing the right thing and helping.
And I think to the point that we were talking about earlier, we need to get into a mindset where all.
Because then the incentive. I mean, it's almost for a cash strapped council. It's. Oh, phew, it's gone on somebody else's land. So that's an appalling thing. But the minute you then go and put it out on the street, you've legally committed a crime because you fly tipped. And then that's an absurdity. And but that's just a tiny, tiny, tiny example of where the legislative framework mitigates against people doing the right thing and helping.
And I think to the point that we were talking about earlier, we need to get into a mindset where all.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
All authorities need to be enablers for people who want to do the right thing. And they are not. They will throw every. legislative thing. I we clean up Britain, put cameras all over the place and put some on the strategic road network and National Highways actually wrote to us, threatening us with legal action when we caught somebody bang to rights, putting a fly tip, you know, fly tipping in the in the layby didn't do anything with the evidence we supplied. It was collected. legitimately and legally. And so there's a blocker on people who want to make a difference where there.
Absolutely. We should be embraced with open arms. Anybody who's willing to help and contribute to the country within. obviously frameworks and such like. But it's just so .
Absolutely. We should be embraced with open arms. Anybody who's willing to help and contribute to the country within. obviously frameworks and such like. But it's just so .
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Baroness Barran
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Baroness Barran
I should say . I. I think it's been a. fascinating session, and one of the. things that's come through has been just how. complicated everything is. And I just. wondered if you could, if you're clear, both of you in your minds, what is there? Are there 1 or 2 things which would be the. catalyst to kind of. creating a sort of. unpicking some of this. complexity that starts to address the. range of. deterioration in the public realm that we've seen? Is there something that would get things going? Because obviously, some of what's been talked about is longer term.
legislative change and simplification. That doesn't happen overnight. So if you were to think about a plan that ran over five years, I guess what I'm asking is what would be the .
legislative change and simplification. That doesn't happen overnight. So if you were to think about a plan that ran over five years, I guess what I'm asking is what would be the .
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Lord Bassam of Brighton
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Lord Bassam of Brighton
Way that . Baroness Baroness phrased this really leans into the . question which you asked me to ask, and that is what is no, no, no, not at all. No, no. They are very adjacent. So in answering that you could probably answer my question and speed us along. So what steps can government at all levels take to create and maintain higher quality, higher quality public spaces? Because I think what you've said there in phrasing your question really does lean into that one as well.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Think fit you first. I think you should go first. Okay. Thank you. So back in the pre Olympics, I went in to see a man called Chris Allison. He was the assistant. commissioner of the. Metropolitan Police, but he was also the gold. command of the of the whole of policing the Olympics. So he was in charge of, you know, whether it was Weymouth, the police, the policing and the safety at Weymouth or in Newham or. wherever it was his neck on the line in terms of the. responsibility for. safety and anything to do with games.
activity and games environments. And on his wall was a t shirt that said, Bob and Bob stood for Single Point of Blame. And what he actually really meant was he. He explained that he was the single point of blame. And what that really meant was he was the single point of responsibility. So one of the things I would really like, and whether it's. legislative or down to civic leadership.
and local.
activity and games environments. And on his wall was a t shirt that said, Bob and Bob stood for Single Point of Blame. And what he actually really meant was he. He explained that he was the single point of blame. And what that really meant was he was the single point of responsibility. So one of the things I would really like, and whether it's. legislative or down to civic leadership.
and local.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
The people that did all the enforcement work were taken off the streets , and we now police are red routes and our bus lanes by cameras. So those cars still remain there. They just get fined for remaining there. And it's a good example of how we've outsourced too much to technology. We need people back on the streets who have a job to care about this and to do something about it with the systems in place. So that is my, my, my answer to both of you, some of which would be legislative. Some of it is budgetary.
A lot of it is, is, is. simply about civic leadership. And I point to an example from the early noughties when Simon Milton, sir, who became Sir Simon Milton, was became leader of of the City of Westminster. And he looked at. Westminster at fresh eyes and realized why we were setting up Business improvement. districts in order to get private sector funding into managing. Westminster streets.
And he agreed with us, and he joined forces and wanted to use that private sector.
A lot of it is, is, is. simply about civic leadership. And I point to an example from the early noughties when Simon Milton, sir, who became Sir Simon Milton, was became leader of of the City of Westminster. And he looked at. Westminster at fresh eyes and realized why we were setting up Business improvement. districts in order to get private sector funding into managing. Westminster streets.
And he agreed with us, and he joined forces and wanted to use that private sector.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
We we didn't know we were going to have to. accommodate electric bikes and. Deliveroo drivers hanging around our city. centres and things change, so I. I would like us to be able to create an. environment where our. spatial or spatial. planning is done in a way where we have very speedy. post-evaluation occupation and we keep an eye on what is changing in.
society as well .
society as well .
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Lord Bassam of Brighton
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Lord Bassam of Brighton
For Patricia Lord Basham. Well, one thing I ought to sort of declare an interest because I chair a. regeneration board for Brighton and Hove seafront. And my obsession with it partly is determined by my desire to see improvements in our public realm, and I think it's a relevant consideration. I can I just agree with what you're saying, Patricia. And also I think what Ed's been saying about the need to change culture and.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Do you have a view on that? Is that to me? Well, I can I answer both your your questions? I think I think that, you know, there is obviously no silver bullet. But but if I could suggest that there are three things that would make a profound difference quickly. And the Department for environment, Food and Rural Affairs is too big and cumbersome. That is a massive, massive, massive brief.
It's absurd. Quite a lot of them don't necessarily tie in very well. So for me, I accept that the cabinet can't be.
It's absurd. Quite a lot of them don't necessarily tie in very well. So for me, I accept that the cabinet can't be.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Sorry. reintroduce the concept of the X-Men, which some of you may or may not be aware of, but back in the times gone by until the mid 70s, when they started diet at pace, there was an individual named person responsible for a given stretch of road, and everybody knew who they were, and if there was a drain block, they'd unblock it. And if there was a public building falling down, they'd say, what was wrong with it? So there was a. connection between somebody who would be the local enabler to make stuff happen. And then in the middle, I would suggest that this is beyond.
essential and might be a good start point. And I think that for the.
essential and might be a good start point. And I think that for the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
The National Audit Office is supposed to be the arbiter of where the money is spent well, or at all, or has followed process. Well, yeah, that's all fine and large, but I'll give you a very practical example. During this discussion, we've talked about road furniture, you know, temporary road furniture signs and. sandbags and stuff and just rubbish left behind after roadworks. My view is that unless there's an independent body who goes to any and all roadworks sites and says, yes, that is.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
And then maybe they should be involved in contractual negotiations as well. But I can cite that there are tens, if not hundreds of thousands of items of road furniture left all over the country. We we clean up Britain and made a freedom of information requests to all local authorities and national highways. There is no record of one sign out, one sign back there. Not under any obligation to do that. This is monstrous. This is monstrous.
That is.
That is.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
In this country. It doesn't happen anywhere else. So at the top, we need a minister in charge of the public realm. At the bottom, we need lengths or lengths, people or whatever you want to call them, to be correct in that manner. But we need that role so that there's a real connection. When somebody local thinks there's a problem, they go and talk to whoever it is and they can make a difference in their area. But we've got to get control of these public contractors, public works. contractors who are frankly, leaving places where they, when they clear the site, are not clearing the site and there is no.
accountability and we're paying them. I'll give you a very specific example,
accountability and we're paying them. I'll give you a very specific example,
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
I've got to go in a minute, because I've got to be in Cambridge shortly. There were some roadworks done near me where they painted the white lines all on the side of the road, not the road. They did it in heavy rain. This was 18 months ago. They've all come off. I approached the council and go, why have you paid these people? Because I know you have. And when are they coming back to put it back? And they won't be back. They'll never be back. And we have. grown to accept such. appallingly low standards in this.
country until we address it. Like .
country until we address it. Like .
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Baroness Barran
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Baroness Barran
As I understand it, based on the evidence we've heard. And I think if we're going to. reintroduce length, if I've got that right, we need to know what that would cost. I don't think we can be saying things without working out the cost. So if you've got that secretly squirreled away, that would be helpful. And that obviously applies more broadly. I think the other point I would just, you know, you mentioned, I think earlier, six different.
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Lord Ravensdale
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Lord Ravensdale
Questions, just gentle pushback. Good point, Lord Ravensdale. Thank you chair. I'm just I'm conscious of time, so I'll just ask a brief supplementary. Just following up on something. Actually, before I start, I should declare my interest. I'm a chief engineer working for Atkins Wireless, and we do do some work in the public realm. So I think Ed's coming back to something you said. You said the.
perception is that the public realm is.
perception is that the public realm is.
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Lord Ravensdale
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Lord Ravensdale
Violent crime is at its lowest since records began since 1981. So obviously perception, reality can be two very different, very different things. So I would just be interested in your thoughts on know, can we can we say anything about what the what the reality is in terms of the public realm, in terms of how, how that has has it has it deteriorated? Or if not, how do we .
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Actually gather that data to say what is going on with the public realm, the latest data, the latest research we've got, and I not good at looking at, you know, the notes, but keep Britain tidy. Do a survey quite extensive. One the last one I think two years old now and. 90% of. locations surveyed across the country had an extensive litter problem in them. That's never been it's been creeping up and up and up by year. So I. Litter is a very visible manifestation. It's not the only thing, obviously, because buildings can fall down, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But here in London we've got two bridges shut at the moment, one for forever and a day because they haven't been maintained properly, you know, and, and that and, you know, we, you know, people I bicycle around London, I drive a car, you know, hit a pothole on a bike. It's not fun. I bicycle in the.
But here in London we've got two bridges shut at the moment, one for forever and a day because they haven't been maintained properly, you know, and, and that and, you know, we, you know, people I bicycle around London, I drive a car, you know, hit a pothole on a bike. It's not fun. I bicycle in the.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Hit a pothole. It's not fun. And we've got. situations where we see a pothole being filled over there and the one over there being ignored at the same time. And they just don't understand that the truck roll is the significant. expense filling in a pothole. You know, we are just not doing a very good job. We used to be great at making and fixing and maintaining things, and we're not. And until you admit that there's a problem, there's, you know, there's a problem. So yes, the perception is very real and evidenced by fact. And obviously, I'm not .
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Baroness Griffin of Princethorpe
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Baroness Griffin of Princethorpe
And then we can let you go. Thank you. Thank you, chair, and thank you. And also, if you have any written evidence that you think you want to submit would be very grateful and it would be good to have the same from David if we could write to him. Can I just declare two. non-financial interests vice President of Aid, Heat Networks and vice president of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute. Just to come back to what you were saying. Lack of. responsibility in one place is a real issue. So I represented the North West in various guises over 35 years, and we were largely unitary.
I'm now in Leamington Spa and I can't find out who is. responsible for things. And that's.
I'm now in Leamington Spa and I can't find out who is. responsible for things. And that's.
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Baroness Griffin of Princethorpe
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Baroness Griffin of Princethorpe
You know, when you try to do something which is community spirited. So I think there's a lot in this about perhaps. legislation and what we're doing about. devolution and trying to marry this together in terms of governance. But my question is kind of the exam question. As my dear friend, the chair would say, are there any. unexplored or. underrepresented areas of this topic that we should.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
Designed out of that space by neglect. Thank you. Thank you for that. I have had time to consider my answer. I think the exam question that's missing is how can the country rebuild. trust in the agencies of government that we can. maintain the public realm properly? Because the truth of the matter is, as a.
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Speaker 1
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Speaker 1
The government's a monopoly. The government of the day is a monopoly. But if the government were a business, would I be happy with the taxes that I'm. contributing to this. country and the visual. amenity that I see around me? Of course, here in Westminster? Beautiful. I'd be very happy if I was wandering around here. But the short answer is you'd never come back. You'd have lost my custom years ago and I'd be somewhere else. And that's a bad position for a democracy to be in, because trust is breaking down at a regular basis. So Baroness Baron said, said that, you know, we don't want another agency.
And I agree completely to sort of audit whether something should be signed off. They need rationalizing right down to the minimum number of agencies possible, so that there is this proximity. between a decision and action. But in the end, the supplementary to the exam question is how can the .
And I agree completely to sort of audit whether something should be signed off. They need rationalizing right down to the minimum number of agencies possible, so that there is this proximity. between a decision and action. But in the end, the supplementary to the exam question is how can the .
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
People who are who are either selling drugs or using drugs there. And there's, there's a feeling that it's a place that people don't go to want to go to. It was the equivalent of what Times Square was to New Yorkers at one stage. You avoided it like the plague, and you do avoid it like the plague. And Manchester are. redesigning this public space. But the then leader, Bev Craig, was absolutely determined that they weren't going to redesign the place and bring back all of the same problems. So I'm advising Manchester City Council at the moment, working across the.
council and the the private. sector people who are who are landowners in the adjacent area about what we should do differently. And in my advice and what we're working towards is actually. unpacking everything that has happened there and happened there, which has gone over or has happened over a long period of time. Nobody's fault, just a lot of layers that have appeared for different reasons. It's a transport hub and it's a now a very, very busy transport hub. And so it's, it's how do you actually. remove everything in mental mentally remove, not literally remove, but then bring them back in the right way.
It's like, you know, there's been analogies to houses. It's like taking everything out of your living room to decorate it and then bring it back very slowly in, in a considered way of, does this need to be here? Do I want this to be here? Is it harmonious? And a large part of it will be about how do we design the. management of that space? And how does how does the police and the and the adjacent building owners work together and so on and so forth. So it will be a new form of management. We don't know what it is yet, but the exam question there is, what are we going to do to make this an.
council and the the private. sector people who are who are landowners in the adjacent area about what we should do differently. And in my advice and what we're working towards is actually. unpacking everything that has happened there and happened there, which has gone over or has happened over a long period of time. Nobody's fault, just a lot of layers that have appeared for different reasons. It's a transport hub and it's a now a very, very busy transport hub. And so it's, it's how do you actually. remove everything in mental mentally remove, not literally remove, but then bring them back in the right way.
It's like, you know, there's been analogies to houses. It's like taking everything out of your living room to decorate it and then bring it back very slowly in, in a considered way of, does this need to be here? Do I want this to be here? Is it harmonious? And a large part of it will be about how do we design the. management of that space? And how does how does the police and the and the adjacent building owners work together and so on and so forth. So it will be a new form of management. We don't know what it is yet, but the exam question there is, what are we going to do to make this an.
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Lord Cameron of Dillington
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Lord Cameron of Dillington
Thank you. Thank you very much, Ewan. Yes, sorry. It's a pity that the other two have gone really? In a way. And maybe we could write to them. But most of the conversation today has been about the sort of. social issues of the public realm and how. society is. disadvantaged by dilapidated public realm. And there's been sort of underlying thinking about about the question of the the economic situation.
But, you know, today, the midterm elections, it's the economy, stupid. Is there any real hard. evidence that a dilapidated public realm leads to.
But, you know, today, the midterm elections, it's the economy, stupid. Is there any real hard. evidence that a dilapidated public realm leads to.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Just sort of wondered whether there was any hard. evidence to pinpoint this. There is hard evidence, some of which I, I can I, you know, I, I can send you some links to report. I don't have the statistics in my fingertips. What I can talk to is the work that I, I led when I was running Central London Partnership, I actually used the phrase, it's the economy stupid in, in talking about this with the picture of Clinton. And because as I started my explanation about my role, I led. When I say I led. But, you know, the sort of being the chief executive, that was the message I, I.
promoted in the work that we were doing in order to actually attract the. investment and the time and energy that I needed to attract to, to, to make this an agenda item. It was it took a long.
promoted in the work that we were doing in order to actually attract the. investment and the time and energy that I needed to attract to, to, to make this an agenda item. It was it took a long.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
But, but actually by. presenting it as an economic. competitiveness issue, it was it did get traction. And one of the pieces of work I, I, I commissioned and we commissioned at Central London. Partnership was the economic impact of quality walking environments. And that was in 2003. And the reason we did it is because in when Ken Livingstone became mayor, TfL was newly minted. Transport for London was newly minted. They had a budget line of zero for walking or anything to do with that, and I did £1 million for cycling in the first budget business plan, and that went up to.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
And it was chopped to nothing in in the. 2004 business plan. So I persuaded them to give me. £50,000 so we could do research into the economics of good quality walking environments. So we could then make the case to TfL to actually increase the to increase the funding. And over, you know, a few years later, it went up to £9 million. And then we did all sorts of.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Which brought. literally tens of millions of. pounds in TfL to, to be given to the local. authorities to. improve the walking environment. And, you know, you only have to talk to the the current. administration to understand how important that is with the walking and Cycling Commissioner. And so that's just one example. And in in when New York did their plaza program and their street, the the making more. pedestrianisation space. pedestrian spaces, the most high. profile was in Times Square. And they did an economic study which showed that counter to what people thought, people who were walking and.
cycling were. spending a considerable. multiplier to those who were in cars, whereas the view was that people would spend more because they could stop and then load their cars up. But that wasn't true. And I can get you those statistics. And then finally, in the work that we did in central London. partnership was predicated on what we called to the right audience walking wallets, so legible. London, the wayfinding. system was designed to give people the confidence to get lost in the knowledge they could be found again, so they would go off the beaten track and explore.
cycling were. spending a considerable. multiplier to those who were in cars, whereas the view was that people would spend more because they could stop and then load their cars up. But that wasn't true. And I can get you those statistics. And then finally, in the work that we did in central London. partnership was predicated on what we called to the right audience walking wallets, so legible. London, the wayfinding. system was designed to give people the confidence to get lost in the knowledge they could be found again, so they would go off the beaten track and explore.
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Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
We could if you could send us some of that, please. Certainly. Thank you so much, Patricia. Lord Porter's question actually was what will make the greatest impact? And I think you did answer that in relation to Lady Baron's question about the three things which would address the some of the small but really knotty problems which then enable other things to happen and have the greatest impact. So I think we've dealt with that.
I just want to come back to one.
I just want to come back to one.
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Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
Actually, which I do think is now quite. important this afternoon. This morning you've actually been talking about public realm, and we've been talking about the. ownership of the public realm. Do you think that term has. Because it's going to be important, for the not least, the title of our report and how we go forward, that if we use the term public realm, we are. investing the question with a lot more.
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Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
Than if we simply use the term public spaces. That my first question and my second question is you talked about. You talked about character, you're talking about heritage and the work you did with Historic England, which I much appreciate. And it seems to me that one of the things we haven't and we should explore is the extent to which.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Do you think those are avenues we could pursue? I think that would be really important to pursue. And I gave the. example of the high street action zone, the heritage high street work, and how that. generated a sense of. community engagement and sense of pride. And it was because of the character of the individual places. And people care very. significantly about the character of.
places and have surprising views on it. And I think there's through Historic England, there's a lot of evidence on that.
places and have surprising views on it. And I think there's through Historic England, there's a lot of evidence on that.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Like the the Architectural Heritage Fund, who also fund some really good projects across the, across the, the. country where people like. Penzance and the work that they've, they've been having. So, so I think that's a very rich theme. I think public. spaces less is, is less. What's the right term? I think public spaces are friendlier thing word than public realm.
That's sort of quite. I wrote down in one of my points to myself is public realm does a lot of heavy.
That's sort of quite. I wrote down in one of my points to myself is public realm does a lot of heavy.
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Speaker 3
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Speaker 3
Don't. understand enough light, the way we light our places sufficiently well. So you might like to consider that, you know, over we over light things because we think that makes it safer. And that's not necessarily the case. And, and there's a lighting design company who were working with. Peabody in an area of east London, and they, Peabody were doing a.
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Baroness Andrews
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Baroness Andrews
As it were. Agency and. accountability are very close, I think. And you've done a great service today, actually, by helping us to unpack some of the. elements of what goes into good decision making. And also, where does. responsibility lie? So on behalf of everyone, I'd like to thank you very much. especially staying till the very end in in slightly .
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