At the half-way point in the Big Local programme, Michael Toyer reflects on what we’ve learnt about community-led change from managing the Big Local reps.
Big Local was created
in 2011 and designed from the outset to be radically different from other
funding programmes. It has a vision of “empowered, resilient, dynamic,
asset-rich communities making their own decisions on what is best for their
area”.
Renaisi was part of the consortium that set up Big Local in 2011 and we managed the local reps up until March 2019. Our role in the programme is very different now; we provide direct support to some of the local communities to help them think about how they can measure change at a local level. With the programme passing its half-way point and our change in role, we have reflected on what we’ve learnt in the last eight years.
What’s special about Big Local?
Big Local is resident
led, managed through local partnerships with a resident majority. Renaisi and
other partners provide flexible and responsive support to ensure communities get
the help they need to achieve their goals and ambitions.
The role of the expert rep in Big Local
After
contributing to the design of the programme, we moved to recruiting and then supporting
the Big Local ‘reps’. Reps provide light
touch support for areas, they are the face of Local Trust and the ‘custodian of
Big Local values’ in areas. They helped get the programme started by bringing
residents together at local engagement events, and now act as a ‘critical
friend’, helping to keep plans on track, and providing a link between the
funder and local partnerships.
With our
practical experience of neighbourhood regeneration and understanding of community
engagement, we were able to support reps when they needed help:
“Support from Local Trust and Renaisi has also been good especially when times were difficult several months ago.”
Big Local partnership member, quoted in Local Trust The Halfway Point.
What we learnt about community-led change
An early evaluation by NCVO found that national partners delivered in line with Big Local’s core values and the programme is doing things differently, with light touch support at its heart, but it’s not easy.
“It can be joyful and exciting, it can be thought-provoking and challenging, but it is rarely if ever described as easy. That being the case the level of achievement, the numbers who have been involved right from the start, and the commitment and hours of effort put in by people in local areas to make Big Local happen is even more remarkable.”
Big Local partnership member, quoted in the Big Local Early Years evaluation.
The role of the expert rep is critical
By working with
the community, going to the places where people are and understanding the
terrain, reps were able to help communities get to the root causes of problems
faster and then help them to shape and set up their own projects.
The reps
support was highly valued by communities, especially their ability to act as
the bridge between the local area and the funder. Some areas felt they needed
more directive, or hands on support for short periods but the evaluation found:
“The flexibility the light-touch approach offers is recognised as a key enabling factor of resident-led progress; where they are not overly dependent on the programme’s support.”
Big Local partnership member, quoted in the Big Local Early Years evaluation.
Trust is empowering, process is helpful but thinking needs to be freed
Trusting and
investing in people to be the leaders of change in their place has had some incredible
results for individuals and communities. The
Big Local model allowed people involved in projects to discover a passion for
improving their community, to bring new ideas to the table and design more
workable solutions for their area.
In many areas that
ambition of resident empowerment leading to more radical ideas for change
proved challenging. Reps found that resident partnerships defaulted to
approaches they’d experienced under previous, more constrained activity. Local Trust
and the reps put lots of effort into encouraging and supporting residents to
try different approaches and reminding residents that they had a lot of freedom
to experiment.
Over time we
found it helped to introduce some processes to ensure local accountability and consistency,
coupling the trust and freedom with good governance and appropriate levels of
support for each area.
Conflict is inevitable
When people and
organisations with a passion for their area come together then some form of conflict
is inevitable. One of our main reflections is that at a societal level most of
us are not very well equipped to deal with conflict in ways that promote
understanding and acceptance – mostly we reflect our adversarial legal and
political systems with a focus on “winning”.
Many reps’ have had to work hard at some time or other to manage conflict in an area and the programme has developed a range of ways of supporting reps in these situations. Good quality engagement and clear governance always help reduce the risk of conflict but large community-led programmes should accept and prepare everyone involved for an element of conflict.
What’s next?
Since handing the management of Big Local reps over to an expanded Local Trust team, Renaisi’s role has moved from one of programme management to directly supporting some local partnerships think about and do evaluation. This neatly brings together the two halves of our expertise; service delivery in communities and a research and learning consultancy. We’re privileged to have been a founding delivery partner on Big Local and the insight we’ve gained is of huge benefit to our other activity on place-based approaches.
The ‘Big Local Measuring Change’ project we’re now working on follows the same principles as Big Local in asking the areas to decide for themselves what is important for them to measure and how they’re going to measure it. Renaisi is currently supporting three of the Big Local areas – Grays, Withernsea and Bedfordshire to build their evidence base.
Read more about community led change
How Big Local areas have used small grants funds to address local issues
Matt Leach: Early lessons from Big Local -passion mobilised
EC1 New Deal for Communities