Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to page 100 of the Government's Civil Society Strategy, published in August 2018, what steps his Department has undertaken to work with civil society partners, including the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s Communities Partnership Board, to explore ways of raising awareness and enabling use of the community shares model in options to encourage community ownership of assets and within onward devolution approaches.

Government is fully committed to the Civil Society Strategy: it is the beginning of an ambitious, evolving work programme to help build a strong society. As stated in the Strategy, community shares is a sustainable social investment model that empowers communities by giving members – as part-owners – a direct say in the success of an enterprise, encouraging them to play an active part in its future.

As part of developing a MHCLG Communities Framework, building on the work of the Civil Society Strategy, we are engaging with sector partners, to explore future options to ensure we create socially and economically strong communities, where community shares and community assets play a central role in supporting communities deliver their priorities. As part of the Government’s commitment to understanding what models of funding will best sustain the community ownership of assets, MHCLG are currently working with Power to Change on a jointly funded programme of research which will undertake a detailed economic assessment of assets in community ownership. The research which will be published in summer 2019 will inform a wide range of audiences including the voluntary and community sector, local government, funders and the emergent community business sector on effective approaches to supporting the community ownership of assets.