出版社：Suntory Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines
摘要：When he came to power in 1997, Tony Blair reacted to widening disparities between poorer and richer neighbourhoods by declaring that no one in future decades should be seriously disadvantaged by where they lived. What policies did Labour pursue and how close did it come to realising Blair’s vision? Labour introduced a new approach – a National Strategy for Neighbourhood Renewal. Minimum standards were set that no neighbourhood should fall below (described as “the social equivalent of the Minimum Wage”). New funds were made available. The largest was the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund (NRF), costing about £500m per year. Poor neighbourhoods also received extra inputs through Sure Start, Decent Homes, Housing Market Renewal, New Deal for Communities (NDC), Excellence in Cities and many others. Physical environments and services got better. 90 per cent of social housing was brought to a ‘decent’ standard. Rates of crime, litter and vandalism fell and differences between deprived and other areas (“gaps”) narrowed. New childcare and health centres, schools and community buildings were built in the most deprived areas; neighbourhood policing and community warden schemes were introduced. Gaps also improved in many individual outcomes between poorer and richer areas including death rates from cancer and heart disease, school attainment, and worklessness. But some gaps did not close, including life expectancy and neighbourhood satisfaction, and all gaps remained large. Labour’s investments represented value for money. The NDC evaluation estimated savings at between three and five times the amounts invested. Evaluation of the NRF concluded that savings from reductions in worklessness were five times the estimated £312m spent on this issue. Labour’s neighbourhood renewal policies achieved a great deal. They reversed a trend of increasing disparities between areas, both in opportunities and outcomes. But Blair’s vision was not realised: which is, perhaps, not surprising in the context of sustained income inequalities. In 2015 we will produce an equivalent report on the Coalition’s record.
