Updates from the team behind 'High Streets for All'

Before COVID-19, London’s high streets were already under a lot of pressure with empty shops and neglected public areas. The pandemic has highlighted the need for local neighbourhoods with a diverse range of local businesses and services.  

If we don’t act now, London is at risk of losing the variety of businesses, organisations and local services that make our local areas unique and serve our diverse communities. 

£2 million in funding 

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has announced a further £2 million in funding to help revitalise high streets as part of the High Streets for All Challenge programme.  

High streets in 15 boroughs have secured funding to help them flourish and thrive. Local businesses, councils and communities will work together to transform their high streets as we emerge from the pandemic.

Projects include plans to: 

• transform empty shops 
• improve public spaces  
• build a night-time culture  
• support local businesses 
• create space for young people 
• bring generations together 
• create jobs in the environmental sector.

The High Streets for All Challenge is supporting projects across London to bring vacant buildings into use, protect cultural spaces and support jobs on the high street. 

Click on the icons below for more information about three of the successful projects, or see a list of all the projects.

In 2019, we partnered with innovation charity Nesta to explore how we could build on the successes of the Crowdfund London programme, which provides a platform that people can use to raise match funding and local backing to deliver a range of creative projects for their area - from street art to pocket parks and community kitchens and workshops open to all.

We felt there was an opportunity to help these types of early, experimental or ‘test’ projects grow into more secure, sustainable spaces benefitting their local communities over the long-term.

The research identified the opportunity to encourage more activity in London around the use of investment-based crowdfunding through tools like community shares, which are a form of equity investment offering patient finance to businesses, which helps them grow and become sustainable, whilst ensuring they remain accountable to their local investors and community.

During this time, we became increasingly interested in how we might support more community businesses in London. Community businesses are essentially “social businesses” - run by and trading for the benefit of local people. They cover everything from food growing hubs and leisure centres, to education spaces and pubs.

Community businesses are interesting to us because for several reasons. Firstly, due to the fact that they have local impact and benefit baked into their mission, and secondly because of the benefit they’ve shown to high streets and town centres. In addition to acting as an antidote to absentee landlords with minimal interest in seeing local high streets thrive, community businesses retain money in areas where they are based; 56p of every £1 spent by a community-owned asset stays in the local economy. They are also more resilient to shocks and disruptions. During the last year, 89% of businesses surveyed by Power to Change were able to adapt their business model and continue operations, whilst only 1% closed their doors. This is perhaps largely because community businesses tend to be strongly supported by local people who use their services, have possibly invested in them, and want to see them succeed.

All in all, community businesses and the way they operate present compelling ways of bringing together place-based stewardship, social inclusion, integration and local participation - all of which are Mayoral priorities.

This February, in partnership with Power to Change and Co-operatives UK, we were pleased to launch our pilot programme Boosting Community Business London, which is part of the Mayor’s commitment to helping London become a fairer, greener, more open and vibrant city as we begin to recover from the pandemic. The programme also supports the London Recovery Board’s High Streets for All mission to deliver enhanced public spaces and exciting new uses for underused high street buildings in every Borough by 2025.

Boosting Community Business London supports local groups looking to set up and/or grow a community business, as well as existing community businesses looking to develop community share offers.

To date, we’ve awarded 9 development grants to applicants, but there is further funding available to provide up to 10 groups with development grants of up to £10,000 with which they can secure legal advice, pay for expertise to assist them with the development of share offer documentation, or cover the costs of Standard Mark assessment and promotional spend for the campaign itself. Awards will be made on a rolling, first-come-first serve basis.

London’s high streets are some of the most genuinely inclusive and accessible spaces in London. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused unprecedented disruption, affecting everyone’s ability to shop and access services, socialise and play.

The High Streets for All mission will support high streets and town centres to adapt and diversify. With the aim to deliver enhanced public spaces and exciting new uses for underused high street buildings in every London Borough. 

Since August we’ve been working closely with London Councils [link], boroughs and partners across the capital, developing and shaping the High Streets for All mission. This is key in helping deliver the mission.

• Two virtual workshops took place in August with London Councils and London boroughs which helped shape and refine the development of the mission as part of London’s Recovery programme. 
• We met with the High Street Network in December, a group of stakeholders and partners, including London’s boroughs, BIDs, built environment professionals, property organisations, third sector partners, think tanks and community organisations, across the capital, to introduce and discuss the mission. At this event, we invited boroughs to contribute to the mission, as well as share innovative approaches to delivery.  
• An Advocates Group has been created with a range of knowledge and expertise on London’s high streets in order to provide diverse and expert advice in the development of the mission action plan.
• We discussed a High Street Property Charter initiative at the London First Planning and Development Advisory Forum - the focus was on bringing together London’s varied property interests around a shared set of agreed behaviours contributing to London’s recovery efforts.  
• Citizens will be sharing their views, experiences and ideas of their local high streets and neighbourhoods through the Reimagine London campaign. 

What’s next?
We’ll be launching The High Streets for All Challenge in March, inviting local partnerships to respond to the challenges faced by high street and town centre by developing innovative approaches for local streets and vacant and under used buildings and spaces. We will meet with the High Street Network in March to further explain the programme to Boroughs and high street partnerships. 

We will continue to engage and work with London’s boroughs, communities and stakeholders throughout this mission and the Recovery Programme as a whole.